Is there anyone naive enough to think that the US government would turn the other cheek after getting egg all over its face? Of course they made extraordinary efforts to capture Snowden before he got away.
Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden
31–40 of 244 posts
Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden
#32One 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"
Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden
#33I 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.
Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden
#34I 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.
Unfortunately the got lumped in with PVT Manning.
Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden
#35The article isn't very clear on an important point: What evidence is there to indicate that the flight was made for the purpose of capturing Snowden?
Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden
#36The craft was used in controversial US ‘rendition’ missions This is apparently true, but misleading. The specific plane we're discussing was used by the CIA, but by this point had been transferred to DOJ for some time. It's also misleading to use the word "rendition" as a shorthand for "extraordinary rendition" (which is itself newspeak for "kidnapping"). "Rendition" itself is simply the process of effectuating extra…
What's the chances of anyone ever being brought to justice for the CIA kidnapping and torture programme, anyway?
Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden
#37I 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.
Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden
#38The craft was used in controversial US ‘rendition’ missions This is apparently true, but misleading. The specific plane we're discussing was used by the CIA, but by this point had been transferred to DOJ for some time. It's also misleading to use the word "rendition" as a shorthand for "extraordinary rendition" (which is itself newspeak for "kidnapping"). "Rendition" itself is simply the process of effectuating extra…
What's the chances of anyone ever being brought to justice for the CIA kidnapping and torture programme, anyway?
Zero. Something like half the country still supports it; it's an ideological football.
Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden
#39Shouldn'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).
Re: Secret US flight flew over Scottish airspace to capture Snowden
#40One 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?
First, we don't know that Snowden is harmless, even now. Most of what we know about Snowden comes from media stories, all of which are operating on incomplete information.
More importantly, back in 2013, we --- including the USG --- knew far less than we know now.
(The question of whether Snowden is "harmless" is separable from the question of whether his actions are defensible or justified.)