NSA Spying Exposes
Cataclysmic Failure of French Intelligence (Mediapart, France)
"Already
quite sullied by the revelations of its own former agent Edward
Snowden, the image of the NSA, and with it that of the United States, is unlikely
to come out improved after these new revelations, which cast a harsh light on
the aggressive and underhanded practices of the world's leading power against a
country normally considered a 'friend.' At least on the face of it ... Beyond the scandal that the now-exposed American
spying will now trigger, the ease with which the United States appears
to be able to intercept the conversations of the most senior French leaders
puts in doubt the counter-intelligence capabilities of the French special
services."
By FabriceArfi, JérômeHourdeaux
and Julian Assange (WikiLeaks)
Beyond three French
heads of state, for over almost a decade, ministers, senior officials, lawmakers
and diplomats have been telephonically spied upon by the American secret
services, according to documents obtained
by WikiLeaks.
The United
States has wiretapped the French Republic. Presidents
François Hollande, Nicolas Sarkozy and Jacques Chirac as well as numerous
ministers, senior officials, lawmakers and diplomats have been
wiretapped by the American secret services, either directly or on the rebound, for
almost a decade, according to confidential National Security Agency (NSA) documents obtained
by WikiLeaks.
According to the NSA summary notes to whichMediapart and Libération, in
collaboration with WikiLeaks, have
had access, within the framework of the Élysée Palace espionage operation, the wiretapping
was spread over the period of 2006 to 2012. Nothing, however, nothing says that
it didn't begin earlier or hasn't continued since. These notes, all classified "Top
Secret," detail obsessive spying on France by the United States on
questions of diplomacy and local or economic policy of all kinds.
That the
United States wiretaps key leaders of allied countries like France is for some
an open secret. That information is now demonstrated by these documents, which
were issued from the heart of the U.S. state apparatus.
Above all, the documents we are making public reveal the hitherto
unexpected magnitude of American spying carried out beyond the scope of any legal
framework or real control. This is because it is not only successive presidents
of the French Republic who have been eavesdropped upon over recent years, but
all strata of public power that at one time or another have been targeted by
the United States, whether ministers in charge of government departments, other
ministers, presidential and ministerial advisers, diplomats or spokespeople. At
the very heart of the Élysée
Palace, for example, a significant number of telephone lines (fixed and mobile)
have been hacked.
Already quite sullied by the revelations of its own former
agent Edward Snowden, the
image of the NSA, and with it that of the United States, is unlikely to come out
improved after these new revelations, which cast a harsh light on the
aggressive and underhanded practices of the world's leading power against a
country normally considered a "friend." At least on the face of it ...
When
contacted, the NSA didn't wish to comment.
Like his
two right-wing predecessors, the current Socialist President François Hollande
has not escaped the curiosity of the big ears of Washington. An NSA report dated
May 22, 2012 [read
below] makes explicit reference to a conversation held four days earlier
between the newly-elected French president and his then-prime minister, Jean-Marc
Ayrault. The conversation bears on the desire of
François Hollande to organize "secret consultations" with the German
opposition regarding a possible exit of Greece from the Euro zone – a subject
that remains in the news.
In the same document, NSA analysts mention the existence of "previous
reports" concerning past discussions on the subject of the German
Chancellor Angela Merkel. This therefore suggests that American wiretapping of
the French president has been common indeed.
Contacted
by Mediapart,
sources at the Élysée indicate that without having kept track of the conversation,
this was "absolutely credible." But on the substance of the matter,
the presidency of the republic declined to comment. The president's entourage
did, however, note that ahead of and during a meeting between François Hollande
and Barack Obama on February 11, 2014 in Washington, there was an "undertaking
to no longer carry out indiscriminate eavesdropping of the state services of an
allied country."
Director-General
of the Republican Party FrédéricPéchenard (and
former member of Sarkozy's UMP) communicated this
information to Nicolas Sarkozy, who "does not wish to react at the moment."
As with a
majority of the documents obtained by WikiLeaks,
the May 2012 NSA report targeting François Hollande is initialled by numerous
people, and which, once decrypted, give an indication of the ultra-sensitive
character of the data now in the public domain. Stamped "Top Secret"
(TS), these notes discuss information obtained through electronic signals
(marked SI for SIGINT, meaning "signal
intelligence") which under no circumstances were to be shared with a
foreign country (NF for NOFORN, meaning "no
foreigner").
The note on Hollande is accompanied, like
many others, with the word "unconventional," which in NSA parlance
means that the intelligence has been obtained from non-conventional operations.
In this same note on Hollande there is a small supplementary
statement that is anything but anodyne: "Foreign Satellite." This
means the telephone interception was accomplished using non-American equipment.
All suspicion is now centered on German satellites being the equipment involved,
although as yet there is no absolute proof of this.
The media has indeed repeatedly reported over recent months
on the subcontracting of the German secret services (the BND)
by American intelligence, which has provoked strong
indignation in Germany and the opening of a parliamentary inquiry to find precisely
the type of documents WikiLeaks has
obtained.
Apart from the current head of the French state, other senior
French officials have also been listened to. According to documents in our
possession and that we will discuss in the days to come, former French
presidents Nicolas Sarkozy and Jacques Chirac, former Socialist Economics
Minister Pierre Moscovici (today a European commissioner) and the former French
Ambassador to Washington Pierre Vimont have also been
spied upon.
It must be said, judging from the leaked documents, the
American appetite for intelligence on France remains ravenous. Another
confidential NSA document (see below) written during the Sarkozy presidency
(2007-2012), reveals the list of French targets defined by the United States. They
concern, in no particular order: the personal cell phone of the then-president Nicolas
Sarkozy, those of diplomatic advisor Jean-David Levitte,
Élysée Secretary General Claude Guéant, spokesman for
the Foreign Minister Bernard Valero, former minister Jean-Pierre Jouyet (now Élysée Palace secretary general), an
unidentified official of the Quai d'Orsay [Foreign Ministry] and Minister of Foreign Trade Minister Pierre Lellouche.
List of the NSA's French wiretapping targets
during the Sarkozy presidency.
For Claude Guéant, former Élysée secretary
general and a former interior minister, "this practice is scandalous. … The
French government must react appropriately. At a minimum, that requires an
explanation at the highest level and an absolute commitment to put a stop to
these practices. We are heading toward a world that is extremely worrying in
which no one has any privacy or confidentiality," the close friend of
Nicolas Sarkozy complains.
Posted By Worldmeets.US
"If the Americans wiretapped
Merkel, I can't see why others wouldn't have been listened to," commented FrédéricPéchenard
[quoted earlier], former chief of the National Police and now Director General
of the Republican Party. "But if we want to be capable of defending
ourselves, our services must be up to par. We need more effective human and legal
resources. To be spied on by those who are supposed to be our friends - that
can pose a problem of a diplomatic nature," he said.
"I, who was a great friend of America, am less and less
so," was the reaction of MP Pierre Lellouche speaking to Mediapart. "I'm
not surprised. It doesn't astonish me that I was wiretapped while working on foreign
trade. Industrial espionage is of great interest to the Americans. We have
conversations like that all the time. It is also the argument people cite to us
in the context of the framework of the new intelligence law: 'everyone is
listening to everyone, why should we stop from listing to ourselves? There is
wiretapping going on everywhere.' Unfortunately, and I will tell this to the
National Assembly - economically we are in a global imperium
where the United States has no hesitation about involving the CIA, NSA and the
American justice system, which then asserts jurisdiction. I will continue to denounce
this," he added.
According to the NSA documents, the landlines of the African
advisors stationed at the Élysée and phone numbers on the switchboards of the ministries
of Agriculture and Finance are equally targeted. One again finds in the list of
targets the antennae of the Government Transmission Center (CGT)
at the Élysée. The center is responsible for maintaining, under the cloak of
the strictest secrecy, the continuity of government communications - specifically those
of the head of state and the prime minister. Another number, referred to under
the acronym "FR VIP
AIRCRAFT REL," refers to a line of the French government's
fleet of aircraft, the ETEC, which is operated by the Air Force.
Beyond the scandal that the now-exposed American
spying will now trigger, the ease with which the United States appears to be able to
intercept the conversations of the most senior French leaders puts in doubt the
counter-intelligence capabilities of the French special services. In this regard,
the Élysée is wont to remind people that on diplomatic and
military matters there has never been a leak like this, adding that in
the case of the most sensitive topics, all precautions are taken … until proven
otherwise.
