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Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden

thenational.scot

101–110 of 244 posts

Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden

#101
post #8

One thing I don't understand - why would the US care? Why expend resources on trying to capture Snowden? He's basically harmless at this point - he's passed all the information he had to few journalists (which would be a better target now) and there's no way anyone will ever let him near anything more secret than grandma's cookies recipe. Besides petty vengeance, what's the point?

Four reasons off the top of my head: 1. There's no guarantee that he acted alone and or without outside sponsorship. 2. There's no guarantee that all the information that he took was released publicly. It would be helpful to know the extent of what was taken, and who else knows it. 3. It would be helpful to know what other intelligence services have asked him/taken from him. 4 "To encourage the others"

> 1. There's no guarantee that he acted alone and or without outside sponsorship.

That has been debated and put to rest.

Our elected officials initially tried to say he was a Russian spy, but could not provide any evidence to support the claim.

If he were a foreign asset, like for the Russians, for example, he would not have acted the way he did. In fact, his handlers would have preferred that he continued to operate in secret and continue to feed them as much info as he can.

Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden

#102
post #88

Shouldn't that be "British" airspace? If the Scots don't like it, they should declare independence (but that failed) and maybe build an air defense network to shoot down unidentified possible CIA rendition jets (not very feasible).

It is both British airspace and Scottish airspace. Scotland is formally a constituent country of the United Kingdom, with it's own devolved government. And while the devolved government does not have responsibility for foreign policy or defence (and several other areas), it does have a legitimate interest in asking questions of the UK government if they feel there is a possibility that what the UK government has allo…

"And while the devolved government does not have responsibility for foreign policy or defence" That's pretty much it.

Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden

#103
post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, it's likely it was a jet airplane as the altitude of the flight was 45,000. I suppose in this usage it was implied to be fighter-jets.

It's amazing to witness the gift of gap that high level politicians possess. Obama says "not going to scramble jets." What the public assumes he means: - "Three letter agencies and the military won't be conducting clandestine operations to proactively seek out and remove Snowden from a foreign country." What he actually means: - Quite literally, he's saying that they won't be sending fighter jets to go blow up Snowde…

Well, yeah. Because "scrambling jets" actually means something specific[1]. I actually don't think it was his intention to imply "we won't send any planes to where he's at" because that's stupid. Of course there's the possibility of a diplomatic mission, or DOJ officials visiting the country in question to discuss matters with the officials there. To assume his words meant we had no intention of even visiting a location he was at requires either assumptions about words people don't know the meaning to, or a very naive interpretation of how things get physically get done.

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scrambling_(military)

Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden

#104
post #17
post #10

I really hope they pardon him eventually. I could be wrong, but don't most americans support what he did? EDIT: you are probably all correct, plenty of people don't understand/care who he is or what he stands for. I still wish the government would recognize that the NSA is acting unconstitutionally and he called them out on it.

Anecdotal, but I have some friends in government jobs, and they definitely have a less favorable view of him. They view him as failing to respect the proper procedures in place to surface that kind of information, and throw the traitor word around liberally.

That's not surprising, if you consider that it became very unsafe for the guy that exposed the Abu Ghraib tortures and prisoner abuse to move around freely in his village, which was a military town.

He was considered a traitor.

Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden

#105
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see why you quibble over the use of 'rendition,' then turn around and minimize the generally understood. If he was just being extradited via official and lawful process, shouldn't that be the term, rather than apparently grabbed via secret flights and skullduggery? You also can't say what the intentions of the US government were regarding bringing Snowden back to US soil, and even if that were the case it doe…

So if I understand this comment correctly, you're suggesting that the DOJ was going to fly Snowden to CPD Homan Square?

You talk elsewhere in this thread about being charitable in your arguments. You are either being deliberately obtuse or distinctly uncharitable in this comment.

The GP (I believe) is making the point that the CIA doesn't hold a monopoly on abduction under color of law. Furthermore I think GP is questioning the assertion that this was not an extraordinary rendition mission, being that this seems not to fit the pattern of a simple extradition.

Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden

#106
post #5

Not going to be scrambling jets to get a 29-year-old hacker. -- Obama 6/27/13 http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/06/27/19166043-obama... He's true though, it wasn't jets.

I think possibly you are misinformed on what "scrambling" means[1], with regard to "jets".

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scrambling_(military)

Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden

#108
post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's particularly charitable to caricature people who don't support Snowden as being jingoist "'muricans". In fact, the term "'murica" is pretty classist; even the word itself mocks the accents of flyover country. There is a serious, defensible, coherent argument against what Snowden did. You don't have to be a low-information cable news consumer to agree with it, nor do you have to believe that "if you…

"but I think it would be better if what happened in 2013 never happened in exactly that way again.)" I think it would be better if what happened in 2013 had never -had- to happen in any way.

That's also true, but orthogonal to what I'm saying.

Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden

#109
post #10

I really hope they pardon him eventually. I could be wrong, but don't most americans support what he did? EDIT: you are probably all correct, plenty of people don't understand/care who he is or what he stands for. I still wish the government would recognize that the NSA is acting unconstitutionally and he called them out on it.

Most Americans don't understand what he did, in my experience. That is, I'm an American and I work with technology and from conversations with fellow Americans who don't work with technology, they have formed an impression based on media sound bites.

Isn't that how those who get their news from MSM get mislead, disinformed and brainwashed?

The MSM just trot out "experts" who have been instructed to repeat key phrases designed to obscure the truth. Gullible viewers and listeners just soak it all in.

That's how, even today, a significant percentage of Americans still believe that Saddam had something to do with 9/11.

Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden

#110
post #72
post #5

Not going to be scrambling jets to get a 29-year-old hacker. -- Obama 6/27/13 http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/06/27/19166043-obama... He's true though, it wasn't jets.

I also enjoyed this tidbit in the article, which I had not known before: "The presidential plane of Bolivian leader Evo Morales was forced to ground in Vienna, after four EU nations refused airspace access on the mistaken belief that Snowden was hidden on board." Can you imagine the feeling of impotence, as a national president, when your plane is forced to land because of such suspicions?

And imagine the shitstorm that would follow the grounding of Air Force One under the exact same circumstances but by any country other than the US
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