Drowning In Information: NSA Revelations From 262 Spy Documents

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Newly released documents from Edward Snowden shows the NSA determined who to bomb in Iraq in just minutes.

A top NSA official disclosed in a January 2004 SIDtoday column that U.S. forces were “dropping bombs” based entirely on signals intelligence, the type of intelligence collected by the agency. He then implied that the American officers involved risked prosecution for war crimes.

Charles Berlin, chief of staff in the Signals Intelligence Directorate, recounted an anecdote about a former commander of his who, in one session in the winter of 1995-96, personally reviewed more than 100 possible airstrike targets in the Balkans. The commander’s motivation, Berlin said, was to protect his underlings from being prosecuted for war crimes, and his actions “really brought home the concepts of responsibility and accountability.”

“For us today this lesson is especially important,” he added. “The planning cycle for dropping a bomb has compressed from a day to minutes and the criterion for the aiming point has less and less review.”

“As many of you know, our forces in Iraq are dropping bombs on the strength of SIGINT alone. We are proud of their confidence in us, but have you ever considered the enormous risk the commanders are assuming in this regard? Are you ready to share that risk?”

Read the entire article here. Via The Intercept

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