Echelon is not just a S Jersey mall that is not doing very well. It is an international communications eavesdropping system run by UK, Canada, US, Australia, and New Zealand. Two major stations are in Menwith Hill UK and Bad Aibling in Bavaria Germany. The EU government recently took testimony that the US government was using intercepts of EU governments to aid US defense industries. The evidence was quite damning. But apparently the facilities were considered important enough even to Europeans.
However the Bavarian state government has finally had enough and ordered the Bad Aibling station closed. Why now? Throughout the world are repeated reports of other US spying efforts that were recently exposed in a leaked memo. This news story is keep popping up in international news stories but is ignored domestically:
UN launches inquiry into American spying
Quote:
published in The Observer on 9 Mar 2003
The United Nations has begun a top-level investigation into the bugging of its delegations by the United States, first revealed in The Observer last week.
Sources in the office of UN Secretary General Kofi Annan confirmed last night that the spying operation had already been discussed at the UN's counter-terrorism committee and will be further investigated.
The news comes as British police confirmed the arrest of a 28-year-old woman working at the top secret Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) on suspicion of contravening the Official Secrets Act.
Last week The Observer published details of a memo sent by Frank Koza, Defence Chief of Staff (Regional Targets) at the US National Security Agency, which monitors international communications. The memo ordered an intelligence 'surge' directed against Angola, Cameroon, Chile, Bulgaria and Guinea with 'extra focus on Pakistan UN matters'. The 'dirty tricks' operation was designed to win votes in favour of intervention in Iraq.
The Observer reported that the memo was sent to a friendly foreign intelligence agency asking for help in the operation. It has been known for some time that elements within the British security services were unhappy with the Government's use of intelligence information.
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Quote:
The operation is thought to have been authorised by US National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, but American intelligence experts told The Observer that a decision of this kind would also have involved Donald Rumsfeld, CIA director George Tenet and NSA chief General Michael Hayden.
President Bush himself would have been informed at one of the daily intelligence briefings held every morning at the White House.
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This is how Watergate started. Silly little story just like this one that, if true, was damning evidence of total disregard for rule of law. Few remember Watergate. Almost no newspaper would touch it. The electronic media was even less cooperative. The electronic media refused to even touch the Pentagon Papers. And so Watergate festered for years, all but being totally ignored by most major news organizations. Watergate was just this kind of story. What makes it more intriging is that the George Jr Administration is staffed by people with the same ethics as Halderman and Erlichmen.
The US at one point claimed it would easily have the votes in the UN Security Council for a war resolution. Did this exposed 'dirty tricks' operation completely reverse countries such as Chile, Mexico, and Cameroon - once declared sure bets for US support? I would most certainly suspect so. This last month, US relations even with close US friends such as Canada and Mexico have hit all time lows. After this story, even the UK now demands Tony Blair better have that UN resolution if he expect any support even from his own labor party. But ironically, this leak gets no play in the US press.