UPDATE:

JESSICA DESVARIEUX, TRNN PRODUCER interviews NSA whistleblower Russ Tice = Tice says the ongoing Snowden revelations show Americans that those in power should be held accountable for serious breaches of the Constitution = Tice’s evolution from being a staunch believer in NSA mission to being the first insider to expose how the surveillance state disregarded Americans’ fourth amendment rights. – March 2014

Russell Tice is 20 Year Former NSA Intelligence Analyst Specializing in Offensive Information Warfare (O-IW), for Black World operations and programs = Expertise in Satellite & Missile Systems technology.

2005 Tice sparked a national controversy that NSA were engaged in unlawful and unconstitutional intelligence collection on US citizens

Snowden found NSA digitally recorded the contents of each and every phone call occurring across entire nations. = Called MYSTIC allows agents to go back a month and listen to phone conversations.

NSA is barred from targeting the conversations of Americans, WaPo warned that Americans are having their cell phone conversations sucked up if they call, seemingly, anyone located in a country where the program is carried out.

NSA has been doing this very thing against the American people for at least the last year and a half with the opening of the Bluffdale Utah facility in December 2012 = Capability to store all content from all communications, both phone and computer, at that facility out there. = MYSTIC in the USA

TICE: Every American has likely violated some law in the volumes of US laws. + US constitution = Civil liberties = Right to privacy as citizens = Citizens don’t have the right to force other citizens to have their liberties violated.

NSA SPYING = Part of US military-industrial complex + Our foreign policy to keep USA as the world hegemon. = US takes over economically or USA is world’s policeman = Make sure that things don’t happen + Use false pretense to invade another country (IRAQ 2003 + LIBYA). = Reagan said we are the beacon of freedom and democracy on the hill. = Fight the good fight against the bad communists and the evildoers in the world

TICE: As a CONSERVATIVE IT WAS SHOCKING when I came to find out that my own country and my own agency was woefully violating our own constitutional liberties and our country has been doing some things in the world that are just horrific.

TICE: We can NOT afford to be the policeman of the world. = $17 Trillion in USA debt = We have to lean more towards the United Nations and towards international policing.

Why Tice Decided to Blow the Whistle on the NSA:

TICE: I specialized in special black world programs = things Snowden would Not have had access to. = Dealing with our capabilities in space and missile systems = Satellite spying on politicians in a program running-up to the conflict in Iraq in 2002 and 2003 = I found out that the US was using satellite capabilities to spy on American citizens. = I found out that the targets were Colin Powell + General Shinseki + A lot of State Department + A lot of high-level military + Corporations + Big-finance = Concentrated on anything to do with anybody involved with the conflict in Iraq. + Those in fiber optics program called Stellar Wind = Domestic spying program. = Targeting was a lot wider = Supreme Court + Justice Alito + members of the FISA court + Congressmen + Senators involved with Armed Services Committee + Intelligence committees + Judiciary committees + Senior leadership in Congress + Hundreds of lawyers and law firms + Red Cross and organizations that go overseas + General Petraeus + Admirals + Generals above three-star level + 2004 Barack Obama

TICE: There an internal mechanism to Report concerns, but when the director is probably in on this its impossible to use that channel + The inspector general’s office at NSA is a joke controlled by the security office and the front office. + DODIG was a joke protecting for everybody. + Congress was a joke because everything I was telling Congress in confidence was being reported right back to NSA. = Trying to put me in jail. = All the committees I talk to were staffers that were leaking everything I was saying right back to Fort Meade and to the DOJ because they were trying to put a rope around my neck to hang me. So I went to The New York Times eventually and a bunch of papers, because NSA accused me of being mentally ill to try to silence me with the press. Thanks to Mr. Snowden they no longer say I am crazy. Then your legal department says to Media, don’t put this guy on the camera.

The initial catalyst was they put me in the motor pool as punishment to remove snow from 200 Cars in February 2004 = And that was, like, I had steam blow through my ears, and that was it. So I went to PRESS. It’s time to go tell what I know.

TICE: At my level we did not use documentation = it could be traced back to us = that was probably the smart thing. We used things like dead drops. So we know how to make sure that they cannot follow our own internal communications with our little group.

TICE: I try to limit myself to only talking about what I consider to be crimes that are committed against the American people and our constitution. = I feel I really have a debt in gratitude for Mr. Snowden because he’s basically taken that veil of craziness off of me. But there’s just too much information that’s been put out there with those files .. NSA was literally wiretapping the journalists that were involved. + On foreign countries I think Snowden released too much intelligence against foreign entities and non-nation entities that could possibly be a threat. = they spy on us, and we spy on them = NSA MISSION.

TICE: NSA MUST maintain citizens’ privacy = In order to clean up the NSA’s act. Those people in charge need to be tried, and if found guilty of violating our constitutional liberties, they need to be put in PRISON. We need to clean house at NSA. = Basically we need to kill NSA and build another agency that’s dedicated to the true valid mission and serve the American people. Not violate their own regulations, the laws, the Constitution. NSA has become a gorgon, a Medusa that has to die, because what’s going to happen with this capability? Turn this country into a dystopian police state.

Click for Source Article of Russell TICE on The REAL NEWS

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UPDATE:

CIA and NSA Wrongdoing = Requires Independent Investigation = Says former chief investigator for the Church Committee – March 21, 2014 The Real News

CLICK for The Real News Interview by Paul Jay

Burt Wides = Former chief investigator for the Church Committee = 40 years ago, the Senate Church Committee investigated wrongdoings by the CIA, FBI, and NSA. 

15 former Church Committee Members = Signed a letter saying there needs to be a new Church Committee into similar CIA, NSA, and FBI wrongdoings.

Burt Wides = Senate and House intelligence oversight bodies = Too entwined with SPY agencies

Burt Wides = President Obama will not pursue an investigation into the actions taken during the Bush/Cheney administration’s ‘war on terror’

Burt Wides = Under Carter had major role in creation of both Congressional and White House oversight of CIA, FBI, and NSA. 

Burt Wides = Headed the Church Committee investigation of the CIA, the first ever Congressional investigation of CIA’s questionable activities

Burt Wides = Investigated Dick Cheney’s War on Terror, including torture and extraordinary rendition for Congressman John Conyers.

WIDES: “..the two intelligence committees…are so entangled in this imbroglio with the CIA and the Justice Department that…you need an independent look at the whole question of what happened on this (Senate CIA) report…accusations of wrongdoing…”

WIDES: “…from the beginning of the Obama administration…didn’t more vigorously investigate (and he famously said, I think we need to look forward, not backward) a lot of things that happened during the Bush administration in Cheney’s war on terror.” = Obama = “…I also have a belief that we need to look forward as opposed to looking backwards.”

WIDES: “And there’s been a movement for such an independent look at that….But I think …there’s a feeling that some sort of independent commission would be useful.

FACT:  John Brennan, Head of CIA = Has potential of criminal liability.

6,300-page report by is scathing of CIA criminal violations

Obama = Rejecting Prosecution = Creates a precedent that the president and the vice president and CIAS are above the law

WIDES: “…in terms of the kind of detail that’s in this report, which, according to the press, has two main themes or results that are controversial. One, there’s the suggestion…that it was more horrible, more shocking than we’ve heard so far in terms of techniques used, circumstances, people’s reaction that were filmed, and so forth.

WIDES: “…the (CIA) results of the torture were not particularly significant, and that in general it was not remotely productive enough to warrant the extremes to which it was taken, and in some cases was actually counterproductive and slowed us down in going after top people.”

WIDES: “…the Church Committee (named after Senator Frank Church of Idaho, chairman)…what we did, for the first time ever, was go to the CIA, FBI, NSA, and basically look through all of their files or investigate all of their operations, in the case of the FBI going back into the ’30s, as to a lot of questionable activities…to see what really had happened….Then a small portion of that we made public…it exposed the NSA’s original MINARET program, spying, wiretapping, and eavesdropping electronically on opponents of Vietnam, which is what led to the FISA law and the FISA court, the FISC court. We exposed…the lurid details of the COINTEL program (infiltrating and disrupting activist groups). We exposed the CIA domestically spying–.

WIDES: We exposed CIA “trying to get them to kill each other (black activist groups)….we exposed assassination plots….all activity against Castro…exposed the CIA spying and infiltrating with the FBI on Vietnam opposition…we exposed a lot of things. And it led to a number of reforms, not only the establishment of the intelligence committees…it also resulted in a number of laws and executive orders to protect American civil liberties and so forth.”

JAY: “Did the CIA more or less not get back to being what the CIA was before the Church Committee?  Especially because…the Senate Intelligence Committee… wind up being so integrated, so embedded, so entwined.”

WIDES: “…any oversight group gets co-opted, whether it’s this SEC looking at Wall Street or whether it’s the compliance committee of a pharmaceutical board of directors. When that’s compounded with sharing very sensitive secrets daily, that cosiness is exacerbated.” 

FACT:  CIA involved in backing coups and illegal activities, the Iran-Contra

WIDES: “I divide recent American history into…before 9ll, after 9ll.”

WIDES: “…after the Church Committee revelations, at least the liberal community was outraged, and especially because they were spying on First Amendment activities of Americans dissenting…(NOW) What I find among many of the same types of liberals who were outraged then (NOW) very frankly, (they) don’t care even if they’re spying on my First Amendment activities…if it infinitesimally is going to reduce the risk of one more attack…That’s the big change.” (Use 9ll = pre-prevention)

FACT:  An American is more likely to die in bed from suffocation that from a Terrorist Attack.

FACT:  An American is more likely to die from Lightening than from a Terrorist Attack.

WIDES: “…real bottom line between balancing security and civil liberties is that … you balance it…Franklin said, if you think you can do it and you give up civil liberties, you’re not going to have freedom; if you give it up in the name of national security, you won’t have either.”

WIDES: “The problem is, if you want to maximize prevention–and the mantra after 9ll was never again…you want to know what every American is thinking, reading, and praying, and with whom they’re communicating and associating. And then you have Stalin’s Russia and Mao’s China.”

NOTE:  Accountability for criminal activities goes right up to the top = Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld’s involved in directly authorizing illegal activities, you can’t “look forward” = 6,300 pages Senate report must be released to the public if one believes in transparency, civilian oversight…the Senate has the ability to go public on their own.

WIDES: “The Church Committee took the position that Congress has the power under the Constitution to make anything public that they feel should be made public….So 98% of what the Church Committee wanted to publish (WAS). 

FACT:  If Senate is serious about releasing the report, they could do it.

WIDES: “they certainly could do it with regard to the conclusions, which is what Brennan and the CIA are upset about.”

Sen. Bob Graham, former Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee: President Must Side with Openness About CIA and 9ll 

Click for PAUL JAY, SENIOR EDITOR: The Real News Network Interview of Senator Graham

Graham = President should declassify Senate CIA report on torture + 28 page Congressional report on who financed the 9ll attacks –   March 17, 2014

Graham = 38th GOV of FL and US Senator now concentrates his efforts on the newly established Bob Graham Center for Public Research at Univ of FL.  He served as Chairman of the Commission on the Prevention of WMD proliferation…through the WMD policy center = He advocates for the recommendations in His Commission’s  report, World at Risk. He was a member of the CIA External Advisory Board.  Former Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee and Chair of the congressional joint committee into 9ll.

Feinstein’s struggle to have more oversight of CIA = Decades of long-rooted struggle 

Senate Intelligence Committee’s attempt to deal with alleged torture crimes of CIA during Bush-Cheney administration = UNRELEASED 6,300-page document created by the Senate Intelligence Committee investigators. = Negotiations between the Senate and CIA for report to be RELEASED = Obama can do that with a PEN in a MINUTE and he says he’s in favor of doing just that.  Report will cause heads to roll = Allegations of criminal activity conducted by various people in the CIA Torture Program.

Core of this:  Is there civilian oversight of the CIA?  Graham addresses this issue.

GRAHAM = We’ve had an active military intelligence service since Revolutionary War. CIA in 1947 = First civilian intelligence agency = Immediately raised the issue of who’s going to provide oversight from the congressional side of the American government. 

CIA Scandals in 1960s and 1970s = Led to the Church (Frank Church of Idaho) Committee = Recommended permanent intelligence oversight committees in both the House and the Senate. = Friction between the intelligence community and the congressional oversight committees on compliance and all relevant information = CIA said the committees got too much into the operations.

GRAHAM = CIA HACKING and SPYING on the Senate investigators = A new dimension to this recurring problem.  CIA’s internal investigation of torture interrogation techniques is the Panetta internal report = VERIFIES the Senate’s Report should have been given to the Senate Intelligence investigators. CIA says they kept it hidden but the Committee found it in a search. = Feinstein says it was part of the original transfer of information so it is appropriately a part of the committee’s investigation.

GRAHAM = CIA should have transferred it = Important piece of information that the committee deserves to have access to, and it represents what the CIA itself, after careful examination, concluded to be both the nature of the investigation.= much harsher methods were USED than previously revealed + Information Effectiveness of the interrogation was NOT USEFUL.

GRAHAM = When I was in Feinstein Chair in Early Bush years, the CIA LIED about the Torture = CIA NEVER told our committee what was going on. CIA claims they briefed us 4 TIMES in 2002 but my trusty little notebook (I write down everything) on three of the dates there was no meeting held, and on the fourth date there was a meeting held, but the subject matter was unrelated to the issue of torture. CIA agreed they had LIES! 

Was committee manipulated by the CIA?  GRAHAM = There was some of that. 

Graham = CIA and FBI told us nothing withholding evidence.  Two of the earliest hijackers were living in San Diego and their files in San Diego.  Over the objection of the FBI, we sent staff to San Diego, and they found a trove of information showing close ties to employees of the government of Saudi Arabia or other suspicious Saudi affiliations + a retired university professor on FBI informant payroll who operated a boarding house, and two of his residents were these two future hijackers.  2 of the people who killed 3,000 on 9ll were living in the home of a paid FBI Informant.

Coined Phrase = DEEP STATE = Their own agenda on how to conduct FOREIGN POLICY and the president and Congress are pushed in various directions. = Intelligence sets it OWN AGENDA and have really their own momentum. GRAHAM = There was some of that. 

GRAHAM = The President appoints all the major CIA figures and has the obligation to oversee the specific management of those agencies. = They better not go rogue – doing whatever they want to. They better be acting at the direction of the president.

Obama could immediately declassify the 6,000+ page REPORT = Brennan, head of the CIA, could face criminal charges + GOP would make it seem like Obama is going to war with the intelligence community = Possible fearful results. GRAHAM = There’s a third reason = It will REVEAL the level of competence of the CIA = CIA doesn’t want that disclosed, and the president is protecting them.

GRAHAM = Our Report on 9ll had a 28 page chapter on who financed 9ll = Censored now for more than 12 years and HIDDEN FROM AMERICANS far into the FUTURE. = “I think that’s an outrage.”  A lot in that report explains how 9ll was allowed and happened.  

PAUL JAY = I do know what’s in those 28 pages (LATimes + NYTimes) = Actual names of members of the Saudi government who facilitated the financing of 9ll.

Obama says he wants these documents to go public, has the power to do so, but isn’t releasing them. = A president saying he wants openness, except he isn’t. + CIA is threatening the Senate Intelligence Committee to stop the release of documents. = A CRISIS OF CONSTITUTIONAL PROPORTIONS!

GRAHAM = “It is, and it’s a crisis which is unfolding, uniquely, in public view.” = laundry being washed in public view.  = If the Congress does not OVERSEE the CIA then NOBODY WILL. = No journalist has access – So I think this is a major CRISIS!

GRAHAM = OBAMA is KEY = “I personally hope that he will resolve it on the side of openness and then be prepared to deal with the consequences…”  = Not just this 6,000-page report on torture, but “also include things like the report on who financed 9ll.” 

Much of these secrets are not really about national security but is more protecting people’s rear ends? GRAHAM = The classification is done by a committee of representatives of the different intelligence agencies = “have the desire not to have their agency appear to be less than a highly competent…” = Nobody represents the public interest.  = They “cover up incompetence.” 

GRAHAM = The Church Committee report “puts an enormous amount of responsibility on the two congressional intelligence committees…to know everything about the activities of all of the intelligence agencies.” = CIA and NSA

SAUDIS FINANCED 9ll – JUST THE FACTS

Click for Sen. Bob Graham interviewed by Paul Jay on The Real News Network

Culture of “not wanting to know” was created to prevent 9ll from being uncovered  

Culture of “not wanting to know” was created to protect the Saudi government

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The Saudi role in the events of 9ll and Saudis’ influence on U.S. foreign policy.

Senator Graham is author of the book Intelligence Matters: The CIA, the FBI, Saudi Arabia and the Failure of America’s War on Terror.

Prince Bandar, then Saudi ambassador USA, within hours of 9ll, contacts President Bush for QUICK EXIT FROM USA of Many Saudis = Heads of the FBI and CIA did not authorize these flights to get Saudis out of the country?  Prince Bandar, within hours of the attack, wants to get leading Saudis out of the country because he somehow knew 15 of the 19 conspirators were Saudis. How did Bandar know so many Saudis were involved in 9ll?

GRAHAM: At the WORST he knew it because he was aware 9ll plot was developing. 

GRAHAM = At BEST his press people had access to the wire services that identify 15 of the 19 people were Saudis. BUT HOW DID THE AP KNOW SO QUICKLY?  The Manifest of the four airplanes showed Saudis names well known to the intelligence agencies. 

GRAHAM = Two of the SAUDIS had participated in “the summit of terrorists” in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in January 2000. 

GRAHAM = US reaction to the REQUEST to LEAVE at Presidential level surprised me after a mass murder of mostly US citizens. No interrogation of Saudi people who might have information about this mass murder and the president agreed to the to allow a chartered plane to fly from Lexington, Kentucky, back to the Middle East with 144 persons. = ZERO prescreening or interviews or debriefing ed in terms of what they knew. After the flight departed the FBI said we would in fact have interviewed a number of them as people of interest.

GRAHAM = EXPLAINING BUSH’S ACTIONS = Murky = Special USA relationship with Saudi Arabia since WW II on petroleum + Special relationship of Bush family with Bin Laden Family back to BUSH’s grandfather + Saudi Arabia a Source of Stability who must be kept clean and credible + Bandar said 75% of hijackers were Saudis put all Saudis at risk.  Yes several members of the bin Laden family were close to the royal family. Bush was NOT at all curious as to what the 144 Saudis knew.

GRAHAM = There were About a dozen ways the 9ll attacks could have been prevented.  A Culture that’s deliberately created (beyond lack of curiosity) 

FACT:  Head of CIA, George Tenet, first briefing of Bush-Cheney said #1 security threat to USA is OBL and AQ and Bush-Cheney demote Richard Clarke, antiterrorism czar. Clarke testifies our hair was on fire for 4.5 MONTHS, but he couldn’t get anyone’s attention on AQ threat. = FAR BEYOND A LACK OF CURIOSITY!

GRAHAM: “Yeah! This culture of protection of the Saudis ran up and down the ranks of the federal government.”  Treat Saudis with KID GLOVES.  

BUSH = We’re not interested terrorism anymore = seemed to be coming from the top a culture: don’t follow terrorism; we’re not interested in it.

GRAHAM = “The issue of whether the 19 hijackers acted alone or whether they had a support network has enormous current consequences. If in fact the Saudi government was the source of financial, logistical support, provision of anonymity that allowed these people to stay in the country such a long time and go undiscovered, if they were part of the system that made that happen, think of what it would mean to U.S.-Saudi relations today. It would be a complete overturning of the premises upon which we have been dealing with Saudi Arabia, that it was a loyal ally of the United States to now being seen as a country which was prepared to sell its soul to the worst in the world, even if that meant putting the United States in jeopardy and the loss of life of 3,000 people.”

 Click for Source Article in NYT