Former NSA Intelligence Analyst Claims Unlawful Conduct by NSA

[paulthompson]

This was just sent to me by well known whistleblower Sibel Edmonds and I have permission to publish it here in full:

Former NSA Intelligence Analyst & Action Officer Urges to be Heard by Congress Regarding Unlawful Conduct by NSA


Russ Tice, former National Security Agency (NSA) intelligence analyst and action officer, has sent the following two letters to the chairs of the Senate and House Intelligence Committees. Mr. Tice intends to report to Congress probable unlawful and unconstitutional acts conducted while he was an intelligence officer with the National Security Agency (NSA) and with the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). These acts involved the Director of the National Security Agency, the Deputies Chief of Staff for Air and Space Operations, and the U.S. Secretary of Defense, and were conducted via very highly sensitive intelligence programs and operations known as Special Access Programs (SAP). SAP programs and operations are more commonly referred to as “black world” programs and operations. Mr. Tice was a technical intelligence specialist dealing almost exclusively with SAP programs and operations at both NSA and DIA.

Mr. Tice stated: “As a Signals Intelligence (SIGINT) officer it is continually drilled into us that the very first law chiseled in the SIGINT equivalent of the Ten Commandments (USSID-18) is that Thou shall not spy on American persons without a court order from FISA. This law is continually drilled into each NSA intelligence officer throughout his or her career. The very people that lead the National Security Agency have violated this holy edict of SIGINT." A pivotal question in this case is whether Americans were being spied on via a vacuum cleaner approach wherein vast amounts of information are sucked in. FISA warrants require a name of the target and would not cover such a mass approach. He also added: “In addition to knowing this fundamental commandment of not violating the civil rights of Americans, intelligence officers are required to take an oath to protect the United States Constitution from enemies both foreign and domestic. It is with my oath as a US intelligence officer weighing heavy on my mind that I wish to report to congress acts that I believe are unlawful and unconstitutional. The freedom of the American people cannot be protected when our constitutional liberties are ignored and our nation has decayed into a police state.”

"These actions by the current administration are a compulsion to secrecy, an expansive view of presidential authority, and reluctance to answer to the people and Congress. Woodrow Wilson, himself no novice concerning secrecy, claimed that it is a 'fair presumption that secrecy means impropriety'. That is a presumption that we have been called upon to suspend in the name of national security, but with recent disclosures that suspended judgment appears to have been unwise. We urge the congress to hold hearings and let patriotic witnesses like Russ Tice testify,” stated Sibel Edmonds, the director of National Security Whistleblowers Coalition (NSWBC).

Michael Ostrolenk, National Director of the Liberty Coalition agrees with Mrs. Edmonds and stated further “I am glad to know that Mr. Tice takes his oath to the Constitution seriously. He obviously knows that his obligation is not to this or any Administration but to our Republican form of government with its proper checks and balances and to protect the rights it was instituted to secure.” He continued “This is less about a particular Administration and more about the natural tendency for government to become destructive to the very ends it was created to fulfill. I hope that Congress takes it oversight responsibilities seriously and investigates Mr. Tice’s allegations in an open and non-partisan manner.”

Here is the letter by Mr. Tice, sent on Dec 18, 2005, to the Senate & House Intelligence Committee:

Dear Chairman Roberts,

Under the provisions of the Intelligence Community Whistleblower Protection Act (ICWPA), I intend to report to Congress probable unlawful and unconstitutional acts conducted while I was an intelligence officer with the National Security Agency (NSA) and with the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). These acts involve the Director of the National Security Agency, the Deputies Chief of Staff for Air and Space Operations, and the U.S. Secretary of Defense.

These probable unlawful and unconstitutional acts were conducted via very highly sensitive intelligence programs and operations known as Special Access Programs (SAP)s. I was a technical intelligence specialist dealing almost exclusively with SAP programs and operations at both NSA and DIA.

Due to the highly sensitive nature of these programs and operations, I will require assurances from your committee that the staffers and/or congressional members to participate retain the proper security clearances, and also have the appropriate SAP cleared facilities available for these discussions.

Please inform me when you require my appearance on Capitol Hill to conduct these discussions in relation to this ICWPA report.

Very Respectfully,

Russell D. Tice

Former Intelligence Officer, NSA

[sabra]

1. K & R

peace.

[sweettater]

8. forgive my ignorance

but what does K & R mean? :shrug:

[MountainLaurel]

11. Kick & recommend n/t

[sweettater]

20. I should have known that!

thanks a bunch! :hug:

[paulthompson]

2. No link to point to yet...

...but I imagine it will show up at http://www.nswbc.org/ the National Security Whistleblowers Coalition website, later in the day.

[soothsayer]

3. "our Republican form of government with its proper checks and balances"

I thought the part about having states was the republcan part. Wait, are we a democracy or a republic? I'm confused!

PS Good for Tice!

[paulthompson]

4. Here's a bit more...

Tice, Russ; Former Intelligence Analyst & Action Officer, Air Force, Naval Intelligence, DIA and NSA

Russ Tice worked technical intelligence issues as an all-source analyst, systems instructor, special programs expert, technical missions operations action officer, tasking agent, field intelligence on-site analyst and liaison, and advanced capabilities officer. Known as a stickler for technical detailed analysis and “by the book” on security regs. After returning from a temporary overseas assignment in 2001, he observed that a DIA coworker exhibited the classic signs of involvement in espionage. After quietly reporting this, his suspicion was quickly dismissed by DIA’s counterintelligence (CI) office. He continued to observe activity to suggest there was a problem and reported such. He returned to the National Security Agency and, busy with the Iraqi War, dropped the issue. When noting a report that FBI CI agents availed secrets to a China source for sex, he questioned the FBI’s competence. NSA retaliated by having him declared crazy, revoking his security clearance, and terminating his employment in May 2005.

About National Security Whistleblowers Coalition

National Security Whistleblowers Coalition (NSWBC), founded in August 2004, is an independent and nonpartisan alliance of whistleblowers who have come forward to address our nation’s security weaknesses; to inform authorities of security vulnerabilities in our intelligence agencies, at nuclear power plants and weapon facilities, in airports, and at our nation’s borders and ports; to uncover government waste, fraud, abuse, and in some cases criminal conduct. The NSWBC is dedicated to aiding national security whistleblowers through a variety of methods, including advocacy of governmental and legal reform, educating the public concerning whistleblowing activity, provision of comfort and fellowship to national security whistleblowers suffering retaliation and other harms, and working with other public interest organizations to affect goals defined in the NSWBC mission statement.

[C_U_L8R]

5. Bottom Up Strategy ??

Since most people are saying that the Republicans won't impeach
(though is their duty to uphold the law and not to set illegal precedent)...
would it be wise to begin persuing and prosecuting the foot soldiers
who have been carrying out the orders to illegally wiretap ???

Certainly a mountain of eveidence could be compiled that would
ultimately make impeachment undeniable (as if it weren't already).

I don't know the in's and out's of justice... but is this possible ???
Can we get another Fitz on the job to hunt down and destroy these crooks??

What's the Dem plan to restore honor to the WH ??

[acmejack]

6. Righteous!

Patriotism is not dead, it appears. There are a lot of good, dedicated people at NSA. The non-disclosure forms they had to sign threaten them with severe civil and criminal sanctions, so it takes real courage to come forth.

[Evergreen Emerald]

7. "vacuum cleaner approach"

Mr. Tice stated: "...via a vacuum cleaner approach wherein vast amounts of information are sucked in. FISA warrants require a name of the target and would not cover such a mass approach."

This is why * wanted to avoid FISA: because they likely could not have received a warrant as their activity was beyond the law.

One of the concerns of the FISA judge who resigned yesterday was that the information they gathered illegally may have then been used to then gain a FISA warrant. That would taint their warrants. "Fruit of the poisonous tree," means that they could not use anything gained from unlawful means.

Thanks Sibel, I appreciate your work.

[Just Me]

10. Isn't that how "Able Danger" operated, as well?

There is so much violative crap that has happened and is happening these days that I cannot keep up with all of it.

This country is a friggin' mess!!! We really have moved into the realm of a police state without fully acknowledging it. It's sad and disturbing.

[Roland99]

23. Whatever happened to all of that?

[EVDebs]

16. Total Information Awareness was offshored and privatized in Bahamas

With Ben Bell III's company in the Bahamas

www.zmetro.com/archives/000901.php

""It began as one of the Bush administration's most ambitious homeland security efforts, a passenger screening program designed to use commercial records, terrorist watch lists and computer software to assess millions of travelers and target those who might pose a threat.

The system has cost almost $100 million. But it has not been turned on because it sparked protests from lawmakers and civil liberties advocates, who said it intruded too deeply into the lives of ordinary Americans. The Bush administration put off testing until after the election.

Now the choreographer of that program, a former intelligence official named Ben H. Bell III, is taking his ideas to a private company offshore, where he and his colleagues plan to use some of the same concepts, technology and contractors to assess people for risk, outside the reach of U.S. regulators, according to documents and interviews.

Bell's new employer, the Bahamas-based Global Information Group Ltd., intends to amass large databases of international records and analyze them in the coming years for corporations, government agencies and other information services. One of the first customers is information giant LexisNexis Group, one of the main contractors on the government system that was known until recently as the second generation of the Computer Assisted Passenger Pre-screening Program, or CAPPS II. The program is now known as Secure Flight.

This is not a big surprise. I'm sure we'll see more of it.""

With NSA, CIA, FBI etc., access in a foreign country, our spying apparatus automatically presumes our collective guilt and then goes looking for a charge (owning an almanac I've heard qualifies, as is being a teacher, librarian, or Iraq War dissenter who joins 'Raging Grannies').

Instead of overloading FISA with a new workload of cases the administration should use an ounce of prevention: don't fabricate intelligence in the first place and posture it as legitimate. The courts should really be looking into how a guy like Chalabi could have duped US intelligence and been an Iranian spy from day one. Who was Chalabi working for ? Obviously not in the best interests of US taxpayers.

Oh, almost forgot, Time magazines' Aug. 4, 1997, article Kingdom Come by David Van Biema, page 52: "The FBI and CIA, drawn by a seemingly incorruptible rectitude, have instituted Mormon-recruitment plans"; the Mormons are by all accounts a very conservative organization. And if you research the early leadership of the OSS and CIA, most were Knights of Malta, a conservative Catholic-only organization. With entrenched existing leadership and growing recruitment of conservatives ONLY, I see a dire threat to our nation's ability to concentrate on ther REAL threats to this country, when all it takes for illegal retaliations on targetted groups is for 'insiders' with a political agenda to hijack the national security intelligence data system for their own nefarious means. Remember Robert Hanssen of the FBI is an Opus Dei member; Wm. Casey, Wm. Donovan, James Jesus Angleton, Allen Dulles, oh I could go on all day from the CIA...were all Knights of Malta.

[AntiFascist]

24. Thanks for pointing out all the religious connections...

it makes this DKos diary entry seem less tin-foilish:

http://antifascist2005.dailykos.com/story/2005/2/8/204225/7523

[EVDebs]

25. KOM made up the leadership of the CIA

Wm. Donovan, Wm. Casey, McCone, James Jesus Angleton, Allen Dulles, etc. etc.

Research this and you'll start to see from the very beginning a Secret Agenda has been going on. Now you have Opus Dei (with Robert Novak !) as a moving force. The Jesuit's are the basis for the Left Behind novels, BTW, with their 'futurist' eschatology

www.aloha.net/~mikesch/antichrist.htm

Do yourself a favor and read Steve Wohlberg's End Time Delusions and also Grace Halsell's Forcing God's Hand. The issue of a Third Temple in the Middle East all plays into this and is behind much of the Muslim world's angst about true intentions of the West in the ME.

[AntiFascist]

26. Also, I think a lot of people were clued in to Protestant Zionism.....

when Pat Robertson led the pilgrimage to Jerusalem where he announced:

"The Bible says that the time to bless Zion has come, and I believe that we have come to bless Zion," Robertson, a prominent American religious broadcaster, told the crowd.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1234216/posts

Thanks for the additional pointers.

[EVDebs]

28. Oh, forgot to put you wise to this too

'From the Nile to the Euphrates'
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/israel/greater-israel.htm

shows how this has been 'gamed' by bin Laden ; the blessing was for all Abraham's decendants if I remember if I'm not mistaken; and be sure to read Chris Hedges Harpers article 'Soldiers of Christ II Feeling the Hate'

www.harpers.org/FeelingTheHate.html

The PBS article on the Third Temple loonies

www.pbs.org/wnet/religionandethics/week319/cover.html

and George Monbiots' They're Bonkers (but this ignores the real start of the Futurism dispensationalism, says 1800s when it was really during the CounterReformation with the Jesuits)
otherwise a great article

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1195568,00.html

If word gets out about the Left Behind eschatology's errant interpretation of scripture, the Red states will have real headaches come the '06 election. Pray for these Red Staters to come to their senses, O.K. ?

Here's a Christian view of what's gone wrong. Mainly a misapplication of Acts 7 and 'real estate based religion'

Christian Zionism, Evangelicals and Israel
http://www.hcef.org/hcef/index.cfm/ID/159

[formercia]

30. and it's been going on for almost a thousand years

ever since the Crusaders were driven out of the Middle East.
KOM wants their power back and they will use our military to do it.
The Pope has no army, so he has to use a proxy, now known as the Coalition of the Willing.

[rosesaylavee]

9. This post made me cry like a baby

"...It is with my oath as a US intelligence officer weighing heavy on my mind that I wish to report to congress acts that I believe are unlawful and unconstitutional."

It works, folks. Our constitution works still. We still have loyal govt workers willing to be patriots and make the sacrifices needed to defend it - as tattered and stomped as she is.

Bless Russ Tice and keep him safe during this trial.

K & R

:patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot:

[mopinko]

12. i believe i know someone who was "vacuumed" who should he

tell? he made a joke about a bomb while talking to his cousin in germany, and had several very odd things happen to him afterward. there is no way this person was a legitimate target.
what would you do?

[Evergreen Emerald]

13. ACLU

I am certain that the ACLU would like to find an individual whose civil rights were violated. With a good set of facts they could take it to court.

[Punkingal]

14. I would tell a Democratic Senator

Like Boxer or Kennedy, as well as the ACLU.

[phiddle]

15. I hope that he will notarize a deposition and

deposit it, together with any documentation which he might have, in a very safe place. Opponents of the Bush crime family have been known to disappear.

[donkeyotay]

17. Thanks for posting this

“In addition to knowing this fundamental commandment of not violating the civil rights of Americans, intelligence officers are required to take an oath to protect the United States Constitution from enemies both foreign and domestic. It is with my oath as a US intelligence officer weighing heavy on my mind that I wish to report to congress acts that I believe are unlawful and unconstitutional. The freedom of the American people cannot be protected when our constitutional liberties are ignored and our nation has decayed into a police state.”

These are brave people who are paying a price for their patriotism. These are the folks in the "land of the free, and the home of the brave." Not those elitist, country-club pseudo-cowboys, lobbyists and bugman spin-men who are raping, pillaging and plundering in the name of national defense. Shame on them.

[shance]

18. Bless the truth tellers like Russell Tice.

They are what is great about this country.

[troubleinwinter]

19. K & R

[Pachamama]

21. Let Sibel and Russell know that we are standing with them!

I am sending lots of good energy and support their way....

The truth will be known....the people who have been de-railing our country and trying to silence those like Sibel will be exposed this next year....I feel it in every cell of my body....

:hug:

PS: Let Sibel know that she is on my list of people I hope to meet in my lifetime! I first came across her name when friends from CodePink had awarded her with their "Medal of courage award" several years back. She is the kind of role model I want my daughter's to know about! :hi:

[alfredo]

22. K&R He's got the right attitude. Makes me proud to have the

honest and brave on our side. Every time a patriot stands up, the darkness rolls back.


SIGNIT- silent warriors.

[paulthompson]

27. Here's a link of sorts

http://news.baou.com/main.php?action=recent&rid=20695

I'm puzzled why DU wouldn't consider this latest breaking news.

[DemReadingDU]

29. K&R