Bigdog (02-20-2017)
After a multi-month, politically charged investigation, German intelligence agencies could find no good evidence of Moscow-directed cyber-attacks or a disinformation campaign aimed at subverting the democratic process in Germany. Undaunted, Chancellor Angela Merkel has commissioned a new investigation.
Last year, Berlin’s two main intelligence agencies, the BND and BfV (counterparts of the CIA and FBI) launched a joint investigation to substantiate allegations that Russia was meddling in German political affairs and attempting to shape the outcome of Germany’s elections next September.
Like the vast majority of Americans malnourished on “mainstream media,” most Germans have been led to believe that, by hacking and “propaganda,” the Kremlin interfered in the recent U.S. election and helped Donald Trump become president.
German intelligence agencies rarely bite the hand that feeds them and realize that the most bountiful part of the trough is at the CIA station in Berlin with ultimate guidance coming from CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. But this time, in an unusual departure from past practice, analysts at the BND and BfV decided to act like responsible adults.
Whereas former CIA Director John Brennan prevailed on his analysts to resort to anemic, evidence-light reasoning “assessing” that Russia tried to tip the U.S. election to Donald Trump, Berlin’s intelligence agencies found the evidence lacking and have now completed their investigation.
Better still, the conclusions have been reported in a mainstream German newspaper, Sueddeutsche Zeitung, apparently because a patriotic insider thought the German people should also know.
Lemmings No Longer?
If BND President Bruno Kahl thought that his own analysts could be depended upon to follow their American counterparts lemming-like and find evidence – Curveball-style – to support the U.S. allegations, he now has had a rude awakening
CIA Director John Brennan at a White House meeting during his time as President Barack Obama’s counterterrorism adviser
When the joint investigation was under way with his analysts doing their best to come up with reliable evidence of Russian perfidy, Kahl had behaved like his BND predecessors, parroting the charges made by his CIA counterpart, that the Russians were fomenting uncertainty and instability in Germany and elsewhere in Europe.
In a rare interview with the mainstream newspaper, Sueddeutsche Zeitung, on Nov. 28, 2016, Kahl went out on what he probably thought was a safe limb, denouncing subversive “interference” by the Russians (“as they did in the U.S.”). He was just a few months into his job and may have been naïve enough to consider what John Brennan said as gospel truth. (If he really is that gullible, Kahl is in the wrong profession.)
So it must have come as an unwelcome surprise to Kahl when he found out that, this time, BND analysts would stand on principle and refuse to be as malleable as their Washington counterparts. His analysts could find no proof that the Kremlin was working hard to undermine the democratic process in Germany, and said so.
Worse still from the U.S. point of view, the two German intelligence agencies resisted the usual pressure from some senior leaders in Berlin (perhaps including Kahl himself) to jam whatever innocuous information they could find into the anti-Russian mosaic that Washington was constructing, a kind of Cubist version of distorted reality.
And So, a Do-Over
According to the Sueddeutsche, “Chancellor Merkel’s office has now ordered a new inquiry. Notably, a ‘psychological operations group’ jointly run by the BND and BfV will specifically look at Russian news agencies’ coverage in Germany.” We can expect that any articles that don’t portray Vladimir Putin in a devil’s costume will be judged “Russian propaganda.”
Bigdog (02-20-2017)
For guidance, Merkel may well give the new “investigators” a copy of the evidence-free CIA/FBI/NSA “Assessment: Russia’s Influence Campaign Targeting the 2016 US Presidential Election.” Released on Jan. 6, the report was an eyesore and embarrassment to serious intelligence professionals. The lame “evidence” presented, together with all the “assessing” indulged in by U.S. analysts, was unable to fill five pages; filler was needed – preferably filler that could be made to look like analysis.
And so, seven more pages were tacked onto the CIA/FBI/NSA Assessment, even though the information presented in them had nothing to do with the cause celebre of Russian hacking. No problem: The additional seven pages bore the ominous title: “Annex A: Russia – Kremlin’s TV Seeks To Influence Politics, Fuel Discontent in US.”
The extra pages, in turn, were then used to support the following indictment: “Russia’s state-run propaganda machine contributed to the influence campaign by serving as a platform for Kremlin messaging to Russian and international audiences.”
Putin answering questions from Russian citizens at his annual Q&A event on April 14, 2016. (Russian government photo)
from what the newspaper was told, the analysts seemed willing to give the boss what he had already declared to be his desired conclusion, but the evidence simply wasn’t there. The article quotes one security expert saying, “We would have been happy to give Russia a yellow card,” a soccer metaphor referring to improper conduct. A cabinet source lamented, “We found no smoking gun.”
Initially, the BND and BfV planned to release excerpts of their still classified inquiry, the Sueddeutsche reported, but it’s now not clear when, if ever, the full report will be released.
The day after the Sueddeutsche story appeared, some other media outlets reported on it – briefly. Newsweek and Politico gave the scoop all of three sentences each.
Not fitting with the preferred “Russia-is-guilty-of-everything” narrative, it then died a quick death. I have been unable to find the story mentioned at all in major U.S. “mainstream media” outlets.
If Americans became aware of the story, it was probably via RT – the bête noire of the abovementioned CIA/FBI/NSA report condemning Russian “propaganda.” Can it become any clearer why RT America and RT International are despised by the U.S. government and the “mainstream media?” Many Americans are slowly realizing they cannot count on American network and cable TV for accurate news and are tuning in to RT at least for the other side of these important stories.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-0...n-interference
The day after the Sueddeutsche story appeared, some other media outlets reported on it – briefly. Newsweek and Politico gave the scoop all of three sentences each.
Not fitting with the preferred “Russia-is-guilty-of-everything” narrative, it then died a quick death. I have been unable to find the story mentioned at all in major U.S. “mainstream media” outlets./////a copy of the evidence-free CIA/FBI/NSA “Assessment: Russia’s Influence Campaign Targeting the 2016 US Presidential Election.” Released on Jan. 6, the report was an eyesore and embarrassment to serious intelligence professionals. The lame “evidence” presented, together with all the “assessing” indulged in by U.S. analysts, was unable to fill five pages; filler was needed – preferably filler that could be made to look like analysis.
What kind of moron believes that the Kremlin is clumsy and inept enough at what they do, to leave a trail that it could lead directly back to them?
Oh yeah. That kind.
The kind of moron who would try to tell people he's a follower of some far Eastern religious philosophy that centers around purity, serenity and truth while at the same time being a shameless shill for the most loud-mouthed, obnoxious douchebag and biggest liar in the history of US politics, while trying to whitewash Russia's role in helping said liar get elected.
C'MON MAN!!!!
Rune (02-20-2017)
Cancel 2018.2 (02-20-2017), cancel2 2022 (02-20-2017)
So the krauts are out-producing our intelligence services...
"It [the draft] is duty rather than slavery. I part with the author on the caviler idea that individual freedom (whatever that may be to the person) leads to nirvana, anyone older that 12 knows that is BS."
-(Midcan5)
"Allow me to masturbate my patriotism furiously and publicly at this opportunity."
-(Ib1yysguy)
"There is no 'equal opportunity' today unless the government makes it so."
-(apple0154 )
"abortion is not killing Its birth control"
-(Desh)
cancel2 2022 (02-20-2017)
Rune (02-20-2017)
No, no, no Brainstorm.
I said they wouldn't leave enough evidence that could lead directly and unequivocally back to them.
Nobody can leave zero evidence behind. There will always be traces that suggest to seasoned Intel people who recognize signs typical of another organizations modus operandi, similar to the way bomb experts can analyze a bomb and infer where it came from by how it was assembled and methods employed.
But finding actual rock solid, undeniable proof is usually impossible because these people are clever and not total idiots. Expecting the CIA to find incontrovertible proof that Russia involved itself in swaying the outcome of our election in favor of Trump is itself unrealistic, but what they have found out about the source of the hacking points directly to Russia and Russian based servers.
So in this case, it just has to suffice to put 2 + 2 together.
Who else in Russia would have the means and motive to engage in such an undertaking?
C'MON MAN!!!!
Rune (02-20-2017)
anatta (02-20-2017)
Oh..Ok..so this semi-rock hard evidence is sure fire proof of Russian hacking in the US election-
but this inability to leave "zero trace" evidence behind somehow magically disappears for the German election?
* sure. that's the ticket*
WIKI said it wasn't even hacked -it was simply dumped on WIKI.who else in Russia would have the means and motive to engage in such an undertaking?
Or there were hackers like Guiccifer =who used Russian type codes...
and "hacking" of the Podesta Emails was ridiculously ez with his password of 'Podesta 123'
But no...it was obviously the Russians,and not a made up 5 page filler report from Brennan/Clapper
Last edited by anatta; 02-20-2017 at 10:28 AM.
anatta the far right conspiracist.
Who would have ever known.
It is the responsibility of every American citizen to own a modern military rifle.
Cancel 2018.2 (02-20-2017)
First of all, the title of your thread is misleading at best, bullshit at worst.
Nobody has "cleared" Russia of anything.
Second of all, who the fuck is the source of your article, anyway?
Checking into it, I find the author is some guy named Ray McGovern with an organization called The Strategic Culture Foundation.
And who are they....?
Oh look, they're a "Moscow based anti-Zionist think tank and web publishing organisation"
Editor-in-Chief: Vladimir Maximenko!!!!
Dude, you are either the biggest rube who's ever lived, or you think we are.
GTFOH.
And say hello to Trump's anus for us.
C'MON MAN!!!!
Rune (02-20-2017)
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