Neue Beschuldigungen: Bush-Regierung nutzte Geheimdienste, um politische Gegner auszuspionieren

"Stellar Wind" routinely eavesdropped on journalists and public officials (OnlineJournal.com)

Wayne Madsen berichtet in diesem Artikel, wer nach seinen Informationen die Väter des umfassenden, geheimen Telekommunikations-Überwachungsprogramms der NSA sind, von dem auch andere Geheimdienst-Insider, beispielsweise Russel Tice, bereits berichteten. Außerdem nennt Madsen eine Reihe von Fällen, in denen die Bush-Regierung die Überwachungskapazitäten der NSA vermutlich genutzt hat, um politische Gegner zu bespitzeln. Wayne Madsen verweist bei seinen Anschuldigungen immer auf anonyme Quellen, von denen er diese Informationen habe. Dass die NSA die technischen Fähigkeiten zur - wortwörtlich "auf Knopfdruck" - absolut umfassenden Überwachung aller Telefongespräche und des gesamten Internetverhaltens (beispielsweise auch, wer wann welche Webseiten besucht hat) jedes US-Bürgers hat, ist inzwischen nicht mehr umstritten. Die NSA betreibt dazu bei den großen Telekommunikationsprovidern der USA geheime Räume, in denen de gesamte Internet- und Telekommunikationsverkehr in Echtzeit kopiert wird und auf Rechner der NSA zur Analyse umgeleitet wird. "Umstritten" ist nur, inwieweit die NSA diese Fähigkeiten illegal eingesetzt hat.

Zitat:

The warrantless National Security Agency (NSA) electronic eavesdropping program known to only a handful of Bush administration officials by its code name, Stellar Wind, and by a few other Justice Department officials only as "The Program," routinely intercepted the communications and transactional data, including credit card usage, of journalists and public officials, according to sources familiar with the program. [...]

WMR has also learned that one of the main architects of the Stellar Wind program was Vice President Dick Cheney’s then-chief counsel David Addington. [...]

Sources have also told WMR that there was a “predisposition” by the Bush White House to implementing Stellar Wind prior to 9/11. Cheney was also particularly fond of using NSA to illegally spy on Americans. [...]

WMR has learned from informed sources familiar with Stellar Wind that it was used to create a Richard Nixon-style “enemies list” and that one of the victims of the surveillance of this transactional data and communications traffic was New York’s then-Governor Eliot Spitzer. Spitzer’s Internet web page visits, e-mails, credit card transactions, and phone calls were all used by the Bush administration to discover his activities with a New York escort service and bring about his humiliation and resignation from office. [...]

WMR has also learned that John Bolton, while undersecretary of state for Arms Control and International Security, used Stellar Wind to target a number of U.S. ambassadors, especially those career diplomats who were known to privately oppose the Bush administration’s war against Iraq. [...]

In December 2005, WMR first reported on a CIA/NSA program called FirstFruits that was authorized in October 2004 that was a "database that contained both the articles and the transcripts of telephone and other communications of particular Washington journalists known to report on sensitive U.S. intelligence activities, particularly those involving NSA." (Quelle: OnlineJournal.com)