FITUG e.V. Förderverein Informationstechnik und Gesellschaft

FC: U.S. creates (another) surveillance office run by J. Poindexter

------- Forwarded message follows ------- Date sent: Tue, 19 Feb 2002 00:03:52 -0500 From: Declan McCullagh <declan@well.com> To: politech@politechbot.com Subject: FC: U.S. creates (another) surveillance office run by J. Poindexter Send reply to: declan@well.com

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4358017,00.html

No more Mr Scrupulous Guy How one of the two brains behind the Iran-Contra scandal this week became one of America's most powerful men

John Sutherland Guardian

Monday February 18, 2002

Last Wednesday something strange happened. The American population was instructed to panic. Place themselves, that is, on a state of highest vigilance. Some cataclysmic act of terrorism would happen - within hours. But nothing terrible happened. Something creepy did. On Thursday there was an inconspicuous news item. John M Poindexter had been appointed to head a new agency "to counter attacks on the US", such as Wednesday's no-show. It is equivalent, in British terms, to Jeffrey Archer being made chancellor of the exchequer.

The agency which Poindexter will run is called the Information Awareness Office. You want to know what that is? Think, Big Brother is Watching You. IAO will supply federal officials with "instant" analysis on what is being written on email and said on phones all over the US. Domestic espionage. You want to test it out? Text-message any American friend, "Bmb OK. Allah gr8".

The IAO is one of two new offshoots of the Pentagon-based Darpa - the Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (it's venerable ancestor, Arpa, invented the internet). The other new agency is called the Information Exploitation Office. Its mission is to supply similarly instant analysis about overseas enemy targets. IEO will employ the computerised sensor networks that have proved so successful in Afghanistan. And, from now on, America - with IEO guiding its smart weaponry - will launch sneak attacks. No more Mr Nice Guy.

IOA and IEO will get a big chunk of the $48bn of the taxpayers' money George Bush is pumping into his war on the evildoers. Never again will it be said that US intelligence agencies went to sleep on the job - or that they were too careful about the American citizen's civil rights to do that job. No more Mr Scrupulous Guy.

Poindexter is frighteningly smart and very unscrupulous. He graduated top of his class at the Naval Academy in 1958 and went on to a PhD in physics at the California Institute of Technology. He returned to uniform as America's best-educated sailor. He wasn't a desk warrior. Poindexter commanded missile destroyers. He won medals to hang alongside his academic diplomas. He is the model for Tom Clancy's hero, Jack Ryan.

[...]

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