The U.S. ambassador in Madrid was summoned to the Spanish Foreign Ministry on Monday in a public display of Spain's outrage over information released by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden. The latest information purported that his former employer had collected millions of Spanish telephone calls. The summons follows similar demonstrations over alleged NSA collection operations targeting the communications of the leaders of Germany, France, Brazil and other countries. But the fact that the NSA is targeting foreign citizens, governments and leaders with these kinds of operations is perhaps the least interesting element of the Snowden case.
We can debate the propriety and the legality of such operations, but no matter what opinions we hold regarding these things, we should not be surprised to learn that they are being conducted. Former U.S. Secretary of State Henry L. Stimson famously proclaimed in 1929 that "gentlemen do not read each other's mail." It turns out that when it comes to statecraft, they clearly do. Though Stimson's idealism left the U.S. government's Cipher Bureau cryptology group without funding, the cold, hard reality of the international system soon forced the United States to resume their signals intelligence activities. As a result, the NSA was formed in 1952 to collect such intelligence and to protect American signals from being collected by other countries.
It is strange, then, to feign outrage when an organization is discovered to be performing the very task it was created to perform. The Spanish, German and French intelligence agencies often cooperate with the NSA against targets of mutual interest. The collectors and analysts who work there are well aware of the United States' capabilities, and certainly they are not shocked by the recent revelations; they collect on U.S. targets, too. Perhaps more concerning for these governments is what Snowden could reveal about their cooperation with the NSA -- and what the public response to those revelations will be. Indeed, the real damage to relations is not driven by government outrage. It is driven by public pressure on these governments.
The truly amazing aspect to the Snowden leaks is that in a span of some three months, a contract NSA systems administrator apparently was able to access several distinct "sensitive compartments" of information and then download a large quantity of highly sensitive "codeword" material from the NSA's classified computer system without being caught. Even within the NSA, operations targeting the communications of "friendly" heads of state would be very tightly restricted. And yet a contract employee seemed unencumbered by these restrictions.
Another interesting aspect of the Snowden case has been the specific documents involved and the sequence in which they were released. Whoever is orchestrating the release of the documents obviously is not disseminating them all at once; rather, they are prolonging their release. So far, they have refrained from disclosing any documents that detail the NSA's communication security mission of protecting U.S. signals from the intrusions of foreign intelligence services. Now it may be sheer coincidence, but it certainly appears as if the releases are deliberately designed to harm the relationship between the United States and its allies.In the case of Brazil, perhaps an additional consideration was ensuring that Brasilia would not extradite journalist Glenn Greenwald to the United States, were he indicted with Snowden on espionage charges. Other releases seem to be squarely aimed at damaging U.S. alliances, specifically with Europe.
The Snowden affair is beginning to affect U.S. relations and alliances appreciably. The Germans certainly were aware of American capabilities and activities, but the report that the NSA was listening to the personal calls of the German chancellor will provoke not only public pressure but also a visceral response from Angela Merkel. Whoever is selecting the particular documents from the alleged trove of data secured by Snowden for release is using them to maximum effect.
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