"You know, and this is a key question that the 9/11 Commission considered. And what they found, in the post-mortem, when they looked at all of the classified intelligence from all of the different intelligence agencies, they found that we had all of the information we needed as an intelligence community, as a classified sector, as the national defense of the United States to detect this plot," Snowden said. "We actually had records of the phone calls from the United States and out. The CIA knew who these guys were. The problem was not that we weren’t collecting information, it wasn’t that we didn’t have enough dots, it wasn’t that we didn’t have a haystack, it was that we did not understand the haystack that we have."
"The problem with mass surveillance is that we’re piling more hay on a haystack we already don’t understand, and this is the haystack of the human lives of every American citizen in our country," Snowden continued. "If these programs aren’t keeping us safe, and they’re making us miss connections — vital connections — on information we already have, if we’re taking resources away from traditional methods of investigation, from law enforcement operations that we know work, if we’re missing things like the Boston Marathon bombings where all of these mass surveillance systems, every domestic dragnet in the world didn’t reveal guys that the Russian intelligence service told us about by name, is that really the best way to protect our country? Or are we — are we trying to throw money at a magic solution that’s actually not just costing us our safety, but our rights and our way of life?"
[source: Read Snowden’s comments on 9/11 that NBC didn’t broadcast, RT, http://rt.com/usa/162576-nbc-snowden-september-attack/, 30th May 2014]
From this you might think, yeah, Snowden, good on you mate!
But look at it again and again, and understand what Snowden is saying, or not saying.
He is not saying that 9/11 was a conspiracy (which it was).
Is he by implication saying that 9/11 really was done by terrorists with boxcutters? He didn't contradict the interviewer's comments on this.
He appears to be saying that the NSA had all the intelligence but didn't put it all together because they had too much metadata. And if so, is this actually a reason to expand the surveillance state, to employ more human spies, more software etc?
He is not saying anything about the war plan as revealed to General Wesley Clark.
My scepticism of this Snowden/Greemwald operation grows stronger by the day.
What has Snowden really told us? That the NSA spies on us? But we knew about this BEFORE 9/11 when Echelon was exposed. And to expect that the NSA has not kept up with the times to read texts and tweets is beyond naive.
What was the conduit of his 'revelations'? The flagship NATO media operation The Guardian (and The Washington Post).
Have previous NSA whistleblowers been given the same coverage as Snowden? NO! The best example is Russell Tice, who was completely ignored, even by The Guardian.
Do we see mass protests in the streets against mass state surveillance? No.
How have spying laws been changed to stop this mass surveillance. THEY HAVEN'T. Indeed, critics say that new laws make what was previously illegal now legal.
Is Greenwald in a rush to reveal all the revelations? NO. He is biding his time, sitting on bombshells, agreeing contracts, and actually cooperating with the very organisation he is being paid millions to expose!
When did the Snowden revelations first appear? Just as the Syrian rebels began to suffer defeat after defeat and Obama had ignored or escaped several minor scandals, all designed to pressure hum into attacking Syria.
No comments:
Post a Comment