Snowden: NSA Works Closely With Germany, Other EU Nations

Agencies operate on 'No Questions Asked' Basis

In his latest revelations regarding the NSA, whistleblower Edward Snowden revealed that despite German officials feigning outrage at the surveillance scandal, German spy agencies and other EU nations have routinely worked closely with the NSA.

According to Snowden broad portions of the German intelligence community are “in cahoots” with the NSA, and have made it common practice not to ask questions about what the NSA is doing to leave politicians with some level of deniability that they knew the specifics of what was going on.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has slammed the US for its “Cold War tactics” of surveillance and has pushed the US to address her concerns about the scope of surveillance, which she dubbed unacceptable.

To some extent the effort to keep deniability in place has proven successful, as the German government’s long-standing practice of not asking questions would’ve kept them from knowing a lot of the details they found objectionable, though blissful ignorance is likely not going to be a good excuse for Germany’s voters.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.