New reports are emerging showing that in addition to NSA surveillance of German government officials and industry leaders, they also conducted spying against German media outlets, and used the intercepted communications of those outlets to influence German policy.
The spying appears to have focused particularly on Der Spiegel, and an assistant for a German intelligence official who was providing classified information to the journalists. The CIA confronted German intelligence and demanded they “take action” against the man, Hans-Josef Vorbeck, who was reassigned in what was seen as punishment.
While the White House hasn’t officially responded, administration officials say the spying was justified by American national security interests, and that they believed it was appropriate to pressure the German government to prevent further “leaks” to the media.
Der Spiegel says that it believes it was targeted because of its role in the release of WikiLeaks data, and noted the US had also repeatedly complained to the German government about media coverage of the CIA’s involvement in the arrests of three German terror suspects.
Erich Meilke may be dead but his spirit lives on in the American security establishment, . . . I wonder if the Germans can possibly miss the irony.
None of this is news. It has been an open secret for years that at least six countries (US, GB, France, Germany, Russia, Israel) and God knows who else systematically spy on each other and just about everybody else.The fact that it is all coming out now is part of the "Putin effect".The US presented itself as Europe's friend and ally but when Putin started grabbing Ukrainian territory and threatening just about everybody else, apparently with the backing of the same US neocons who have been trying (and failing!) to undermine the EU for at least 35 years, the US response was not up to the standard of what Europe expected, although that now seems to be slowly changing. Thus, a lot of things that would have been overlooked "between friends" before are now regarded as offensive.
Grabbing Ukrainian territory? That might be the perception but not reality. Ukraine's prior elected govt was violently overthrown by ultra-nationalists of Ukraine controlled by the EU/US establishment because the elected president had the audacity to make a trade deal with Russia instead of the threatened deal from EU/US. The folks in Crimea actually voted to secede from Ukraine and become once again a part of Russia. Then, the thug President Peroshenko decided to kill his own people in Eastern Ukraine by attacking them so Russia had a responsibility to protect and did so; really no different than what Samantha Powers used to justify their murderous campaign in Libya.
Big brother — 1984
There can be nothing more deceitful then to spy on a friend, to gain power over and turn into a slave one who must shun you a most hurtful enemy to the very end.
Unless your paid actor politicians putting on a façade, all to brainwash the public into excepting a master-slave relationship with an all-knowing elite
our secret police were once their secret police.
The Germans don't quite understand that their country belongs to us, not to them.
Hello, the criminals in the NSA are violating the law of the land in the U.S. by spying on us so for them to spy on friendly leaders is not soooo shocking.