Did Lying NSA Chief Alexander Just Accuse Obama of Lying?

[unhappycamper]

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/10/28-3



Did Lying NSA Chief Alexander Just Accuse Obama of Lying?
by Marcy Wheeler
Published on Monday, October 28, 2013 by Empty Wheel

I noted the other day the reason the non-denial confirmation that NSA wiretapped Angela Merkel raised the stakes for what President obama told the Chancellor in June about the spying. Did he give assurances she hadn’t been tapped?

If he did, anonymous leakers from the NSA’s vicinity suggest, he knowingly lied.

In Germany, Der Spiegel reported that the NSA’s Special Collection Service (SCS) had listed Merkel’s phone number since 2002. The number was still on the list – marked as “GE Chancellor Merkel” – weeks before Obama visited Berlin in June, raising the possibility that the German leader had been under surveillance for more than a decade. In an SCS document cited by the magazine, the agency said it had a “not legally registered spying branch” in the US embassy in Berlin, the exposure of which would lead to “grave damage for the relations of the United States to another government”.

~snip~

The German tabloid Bild reported that Obama was personally informed about US surveillance against Merkel by the director of the NSA, Keith Alexander, in 2010, and allowed the operation to continue. The newspaper cited “a secret intelligence employee who is familiar with the NSA operation against Merkel”. The Bild article also claimed that intelligence gathered by US spies based in Berlin was not channelled to NSA headquarters in Forte Meade, Maryland, but directly to the White House.


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Oh, what a tangled web we weave........

[dipsydoodle]

1. When first we practise to deceive.

[DonViejo]

4. But who is doing the deceiving....

dipsydoodle? The folks leaking and publications reporting the President was informed and knew of the spying or the folks saying just the opposite, e.g. ...

The left leaning "The Guardian"

NSA denies discussing Merkel phone surveillance with Obama
Agency says report in German press that president was briefed on monitoring of chancellor's phone is 'not true'

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/oct/27/barack-obama-nsa-angela-merkel-germany

and/or the right leaning "Telegraph"

NSA denies Barack Obama was informed of Angela Merkel phone tapping
Keith Alexander did not inform Barack Obama that Angela Merkel's phone was tapped, NSA says
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/10407972/NSA-denies-Barack-Obama-was-informed-of-Angela-Merkel-phone-tapping.html

[dipsydoodle]

5. Semantics

The statement does not make it clear whether the president was informed of the bugging operation by other means.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-24698142

[DonViejo]

6. Hmmm, I'm not certain but....

please don't get the idea I'm trying to argue with you, rather, I'm just noting there appear to be at least 97,000 variations on a theme going on about the "bugging." Then too, it's the German publications reporting Obama knew their PM was bugged and Brit publications saying he didn't!

[dipsydoodle]

7. Yes - lots of variations.

[MannyGoldstein]

2. So... Who was telling who the least untruthful thing they could?

So complicated... need coffee...

[hlthe2b]

3. I find it dismal, but if (and I say "IF") our President lied on this to Merkel..

there will be a shit storm in our future relations with all of Europe and what little trust we might have regained since Bush* will be decimated. And, that includes any "semantic" games.