Flashpoints July 12: talk w JAMES BAMFORD, author of NSA Body of Secrets; Poets

KPFA Flashpoints News Radio

ACTION CALL: BOHEMIAN GROVE: Fat Cats Festival Parade: 1PM Saturday July 13th, 2002

A Strange Kind of Freedom : The biggest threat to liberty in the US may come from other kinds of fundamentalism: Jewish and Christian, by Robert Fisk, "Dennis Bernstein sums it up quite simply: 'Any US journalist, columnist, editor, college professor, student-activist, public official or clergy member who dares to speak critically of Israel or accurately report the brutalities of its illegal occupation will be vilified as an anti-Semite.' " (story)

Friday, July 12, 2002 - Start Audio
-00:00 Dennis Bernstein: (joined in progress) about the National Security Agency (NSA), interview with James Bamford, author of Body of Secrets, Anatomy of the Ultra Secret National Security Agency (NSA).. Bamford: NSA the largest budget of any of the US intelligence agencies.. most of the intelligence collected by the US comes from the NSA.. 80% of the intelligence comes from them.. eavesdropping on emails, telephone, faxes.. the budget is $4 billion dollars a year plus $3 billion for satelites.. who's in charge? somebody nobody ever heard of.. very behind the scenes, doesn't get involved in politics.. Dennis: the NSA's role in the current global war on terrorism?.. Bamford: THEY PICKED UP INDICATIONS OF A POSSIBLE TERRORIST INCIDENCE ON SEPT 10, BUT DIDN'T TRANSLATE IT UNTIL SEPT 12.. in 1976.. the Church Committee formed to protect the privacy of us citizens.. NSA has a horrible history of violating civil liberties.. a very secret order issued that NSA didn't have to obey the laws.. about operation Shamrock, secret agreement with Western Union, would get computer tapes of all telegrams sent every day.. antiwar protesters watched in the Nixon years.. somewhat corrected by the Church Committee.. looked into abuses, created reforms.. these reforms now being cast aside.. watered down, weakened, done away with.. Congress doesn't even know.. and NSA has a tremendous difficulty with translators.. the Sept 10 warning, not translated until Sept 12.. millions of communications.. one possibility, creating a 'linguistic reserve'.. over 6,500 languages in the world..
-12:12 Dennis: about the Israeli attack on the USS Liberty.. (Wash.Report) (search).. Bamford: at the time of the six day war June 1967, the USS Liberty sailing around the coast of Africa.. a NSA listening post, sailing in a dogleg pattern off the Sanai in international waters.. flying an enormous US flag on the back, listed in Jane's Fighting Ships.. the whole ship covered with antennas.. sailing slow about 3 knots.. the Israelis did 13 surveillance flights (photo) (more photos) in the morning.. then at 2PM they came in strafing back and forth, dropped a bomb on the ship, napalmed the ship.. then three torpedo boats in firing squad arrangement, fired all their torpedoes.. enough to sink three aircraft carriers.. one hit amidships.. blew a 40 foot hole.. 34 Americans dead, hundreds wounded.. then they fired on the lifeboats, fired on people jumping off the ship.. one of the torpedo boats even grabbed one of the US lifeboats and put it on their ship.. this was broad daylight.. THE ISRAELIS SAID THEY THOUGHT IT WAS AN EGYPTIAN HORSE CARRIER.. THE SHIP SAID USS LIBERTY IN 13 FOOT LETTERS.. A MISTAKE? NOBODY IN AMERICAN INTELLIGENCE BELIEVED THAT.. ALL EVIDENCE POINTS TO IT BEING DELIBERATE.. the Congress cowardly refused to hold a hearing (sign a petition for a Congressional Investigation and/or write your Congresspeople), and President Johnson swept it under the rug.. an act of terrorism against US forces.. US never sent one investigator to Israel to explore why this happened.. the US at the time was supplying money and equipment to Israel, and Israel was a close ally, no reason we couldn't have sent investigators to Israel.. Dennis: Why did America's closest ally do this? Bamford: it's all speculation.. about what was going on that Israel would have wanted to hide.. about Lou ^^^^, who thought the Israelis didn't want the US to find out about what they were doing.. on the Sanai Peninsula.. the slaughter of Egyptian prisoners of war (POWs).. maybe as many as 900.. but kept secret until 1995.. when revealed by Israeli historians.. background: in 1967 Israel pushed quickly through the Sanai.. in a hurry to occupy as much of the Sanai as possible.. collected a lot of POWs, no place to put them.. decided to execute them.. some had to dig their own graves.. Dennis: about the crew? and families of the dead?.. Bamford: the Liberty Veterans Association (link2).. initially enormous pressure on the survivors NOT to talk or THREATENED they would be put in jail.. finally in 1982, the veterans braved to speak out.. Captain McGonagle given the Congressional Medal of Honor.. President Johnson afraid of Israel, wouldn't give the medal to Captain McGonagle publicly.. Dennis: recently Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney raised this issue along with a (Wisconsin legislator).. she was called a traitor.. Bamford: the last thing Congress wants to do is offend the Israeli lobby. (OFFICIAL SITE OF THE LIBERTY SURVIVORS)
-28:45 Dennis: about operation North Woods, plans to attack Americans and blame it on Cuba.. Bamford: to be fair, NSA had nothing to do with this.. an extraordinary operation.. the Bay of Pigs a total failure, Castro forces killed or captured most of the invaders.. the joint chiefs wanted to go in with US forces and institute our own puppet government.. in order to do that, they wanted to have support of the citizens and world.. WANTED TO SHOW CUBA ATTACKING THE UNITED STATES, BUT CUBA WASN'T ATTACKING THE US.. THEY CAME UP WITH A PLAN.. TO CREATE TERRORISM IN THE UNITED STATES.. CITIZENS WERE TO BE SHOT ON AMERICAN STREETS, BOMBS TO BE EXPLODED IN MIAMI AND DC.. BLOW UP A PHONEY PLANE IN THE CARRIBEAN AND BLAME IT ALL ON CUBA.. SINKING REFUGEE BOATS.. JOHN GLENN ABOUT TO GO INTO SPACE.. THE JOINT CHIEFS HAD A PLAN TO BLAME CUBA IF THE ROCKET BLEW UP.. ALL TO ANGER THE AMERICAN PUBLIC.. THE HIGHEST MILITARY STRUCTURE IN THE COUNTRY PLANNING TO KILL AMERICANS.. blow up an American ship in Havana harbor, the Remember the Maine scenario.. made its way to Sec of Defence, he turned it down.. the plan never went far, but important to note it went as high as it could in the American military.. the name for this kind of operation, a pretext operation.. in Vietnam, there were pretext operations, we think, that led to American involvement.. the attacks described against the Maddox and Turner Joy never took place.. led to the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution.. Dennis: no surprising some people want a full investigation into 9/11.. Bamford: a popular movie, Seven Days in May, about a military coup in the US.. this thought didn't come out of thin air.. about Ken Starr, who tried to prosecute me for writing The Puzzle Palace.. when I wrote Body of Secrets a change of attitude, they let me interview the director and get Freedom Of Information documents.. post 9/11 the FOI under attack.. I was very surprised to find out some of the things I did.. about North Woods.. how easily information is eavesdropped on today..
-45:45 Rainjeeta Geisler: radically great poetry.. now with Rubert Estanislao and Jamie Kennedy of the Berkeley Slam Team.. Rupert performs 'Empress'.. Jamie and Rupert.. you can email Rupert at BringTheDarkness@yahoo.com; Jamie at TongueArtillery@yahoo.com
-55:14 End today's show. today's review by john lionheart

Inglewood tourist and amatuer videographer, Mitchell Crooks.. arrested and taken away screaming minutes before he was scheduled to be interviewed on CNN.. following an encounter Wednesday between Crooks and the DA on radio (listen to audio).. Crooks: I'm fearing for my life, (you)'re going to kick my ass in a cell.. for taping (Donovan's beating).. I told you I'm willing to cooperate.. I want the best possible result for everyone.. well not for officer Jeremy Morse- DA: (interrupting) You tell us where you are *right now*.. Robert: the officer trying to claimn (KTLA) **.. little disabled Donovan was brutalizing *him* (story).. another embarrassing tape airs today: an Arthur Andersen promo video from 1995 featuring 'player' the then Halliburton CEO Dick Cheney praising AA.. Cheney: AA a very important part of the business.. one of the things I like they do for us, I get good advice.. over and above by they book auditing arrangements.. Cheney sued by Judicial Watch. **(and why is Donovan's two cents worth left until the very end of this KTLA news article?)