California Conservative

Tom and John at RealClearPolitics have posted the transcript of Gen. Michael Hayden’s speech to the National Press Club. Naturally, I read the entire speech and gleened much new information. Here’s some of the most informative information I found:

…we also turned on the spigot of NSA reporting to FBI in, frankly, an unprecedented way. We found that we were giving them too much data in too raw form. We recognized it almost immediately, a question of weeks, and we made all of the appropriate adjustments. Now, this flow of data to the FBI has also become part of the current background noise, and despite reports in the press of thousands of tips a month, our reporting has not even approached that kind of pace. You know, I actually find this a little odd. After all the findings of the 9/11 commission and other bodies about the failure to share intelligence, I’m up here feeling like I have to explain pushing data to those who might be able to use it. And of course, it’s the nature of intelligence that many tips lead nowhere, but you have to go down some blind alleys to find the tips that pay off.

In other words, reports of thousands and thousands of American citizens having their conversations wiretapped is baloney. I also found it odd that some of the people who were upset that we didn’t connect the dots now are the people who say that we can’t uncover the dots, at least without running through a maze of bureaucratic red tape. In case those critics hadn’t noticed, the enemy doesn’t have to play by those rules. How do these critics expect the NSA to protect us from these terrorists?

But we all have personal responsibility, and in the end, NSA would have to implement this, and every operational decision the agency makes is made with the full involvement of its legal office. NSA professional career lawyers, and the agency has a bunch of them, have a well-deserved reputation. They’re good, they know the law, and they don’t let the agency take many close pitches.

And so even though I knew the program had been reviewed by the White House and by DOJ, by the Department of Justice, I asked the three most senior and experienced lawyers in NSA: Our enemy in the global war on terrorism doesn’t divide the United States from the rest of the world, the global telecommunications system doesn’t make that distinction either, our laws do and should; how did these activities square with these facts?

They reported back to me. They supported the lawfulness of this program. Supported, not acquiesced. This was very important to me. A veteran NSA lawyer, one of the three I asked, told me that a correspondent had suggested to him recently that all of the lawyers connected with this program have been very careful from the outset because they knew there would be a day of reckoning. The NSA lawyer replied to him that that had not been the case. NSA had been so careful, he said, and I’m using his words now here, NSA had been so careful because in this very focused, limited program, NSA had to ensure that it dealt with privacy interests in an appropriate manner. In other words, our lawyers weren’t careful out of fear; they were careful out of a heartfelt, principled view that NSA operations had to be consistent with bedrock legal protections.

Some important points about this passage:

• The NSA’s lawyers weren’t careful because they’d face a “day of reckoning”. They were careful because they wanted to properly deal with legitimate privacy issues before they became problems.
• According to Gen. Hayden, this is a “very focused, limited program.” It isn’t the monstrous program that the uninformed critics claim. It isn’t invasive to the point of monitoring domestic calls or emails.

Let’s examine why we should believe that this is a focused, limited program”:

SIGINT takes in alot of data even when it’s focused. What benefit would there be if it weren’t focused? Wouldn’t all that ‘extra data’ really stand in the way of the NSA being able to focus on the terrorists? Wouldn’t the extra data of an unfocused SIGINT operation get in the way of determining what the terrorists are planning? Therefore, in addition to wanting to deal with privacy issues, it’s a matter of staying on mission.

This is targeted and focused. This is not about intercepting conversations between people in the United States. This is hot pursuit of communications entering or leaving America involving someone we believe is associated with al Qaeda. We bring to bear all the technology we can to ensure that this is so.

In other words, they don’t have time to waste. Their focus is on dealing with detecting AQ’s international communications. Everything else is a waste of time.

So let me make this clear. When you’re talking to your daughter at state college, this program cannot intercept your conversations. And when she takes a semester abroad to complete her Arabic studies, this program will not intercept your communications.
———-
One end of any call targeted under this program is always outside the United States.

Without this attention to detail, they’d be seeing so much information that they couldn’t detect AQ’s actions in the timely fashion that they currently detect their actions.

As I was talking with them, we were in the office spaces there, typical office spaces anywhere in the world, I looked out over their heads, and this is the workforce that deals with the program the president discussed several weeks ago, I looked out over their heads to see a large sign fixed to one of those pillars that go up through our operations building that breaks up the office space. That sign is visible from almost anywhere in this large area. It’s yellow with bold black letters on it. The title is readable from 50 feet: What constitutes a U.S. person?
And that title was followed by a detailed explanation of the criteria. That has always been the fundamental tenet of privacy for NSA. And here it was in the center of a room guiding the actions of a workforce determined to prevent another attack on the United States. Security and liberty. The people at NSA know what their job is. I know what my job is too. I learned a lot from NSA and its culture during my six years there.

But I come from a culture too. I’ve been a military officer for nearly 37 years, and from the start, I’ve taken an oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. I would never violate that Constitution nor would I abuse the rights of the American people. As the director, I was the one responsible to ensure that this program was limited in its scope and disciplined in its application.

It sounds to me like their focus is on maintaining their focus that meets legal definitions. It’s also obvious that Gen. Hayden, when he still worked there, took his officers’ oath to “protect and defend the Constitution of the United States” very seriously.

At the end of the day, people can choose to not believe what Gen. Hayden has said. That’s their right in the USA. I’ll simply say that I won’t take them seriously until they provide proof for their distrust. Simple mistrust won’t cut it with me.

Cross-post at LetFreedomRing

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 25th, 2006 at 3:37 am and is filed under Author: Gary Gross, Homeland Security, Law, Terrorism. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.