NSA Officials Consider Edward Snowden Amnesty In Return For Documents

[Purveyor]

National Security Agency officials are considering a controversial amnesty that would return Edward Snowden to the United States, in exchange for the extensive document trove the whistleblower took from the agency.

An amnesty, which does not have the support of the State Department, would represent a surprising denouement to an international drama that has lasted half a year. It is particularly unexpected from a surveillance agency that has spent months insisting that Snowden’s disclosures have caused vast damage to US national security.

The NSA official in charge of assessing the alleged damage caused by Snowden’s leaks, Richard Ledgett, told CBS News an amnesty still remains controversial within the agency, which has spent the past six months defending itself against a global outcry and legislative and executive proposals to restrain its broad surveillance activities.

“My personal view is, yes, it’s worth having a conversation about,” Ledgett, who is under consideration to become the agency’s top civilian, said in an interview slated to air Sunday evening on 60 Minutes. “I would need assurances that the remainder of the data could be secured, and my bar for those assurances would be very high. It would be more than just an assertion on his part.”

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http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/15/nsa-edward-snowden-amnesty-documents

[jollyreaper2112]

1. Wow

I find it remarkable that they would even go this far to try to get him back. It's obviously a trap but it's further than they've ever gone previously. But of course amnesty with one agency doesn't cut it if another agency doesn't agree.

I read the rolling stone article. Snowden is like a kamikaze. I don't mean that as criticism. Americans couldn't understand the idea of not just being willing to die for your country but ensuring it. It is an alien mentality. Likewise, Washington can't understand principle and self-sacrifice. Everyone is corrupt and cynical and looking out for number one and that's how they expect everyone else to behave. Someone who has a great job and a hot girlfriend and a fast track career to bigger and better things, they can understand someone selling that out for even more money but for principle? To become a permanent fugitive from his own government? Even worse, captured and given the full Manning? This kid is crazy. There's no way to understand him. And what if there are more like him?

Personally, I do think there has to be more than a little bit of crazy to be willing to put it on the line like this. Snowden didn't operate in the heat of the moment, it isn't a fit of passion. This is slow and deliberate and intentional. He planned this for a very long time and had all that time to think of the consequences. This isn't like the guy leaping on the grenade to save his squad, this is leaping into a jail cell to save his country with several years to think it through and back out at any time.