08-07-2014, 07:16 AM
And this is an interesting change in policy. Germany is now going to surveil its allies:
Quote:Germany plans counter-espionage against Britain and US
Germany announces it is planning "surveillance" of intelligence operations of allies including Britain, US and France after American "double agent" scandal uncovered
Chancellor Angela Merkel interrupted a current trade visit to China on Monday to describe the scandal as a "very serious development" Photo: Getty
By Tony Paterson, Berlin
3:41PM BST 07 Jul 2014
Chancellor Angela Merkel's government is planning surveillance of British and American intelligence gathering in Germany for the first time since 1945 in response to an embarrassing US-German "double agent" scandal which has damaged relations between Berlin and Washington.
The unprecedented change to Berlin's counter-espionage policy was announced by Mrs Merkel's Interior Minister, Thomas de Maiziere. He told the mass-circulation Bild newspaper that Berlin wanted "360 degree surveillance" of all intelligence gathering operations in Germany.
His announcement came as several MPs in Mrs Merkel's government demanded the expulsion of the American agents in Germany who last week were found to have used the services of a German "double agent" to obtain secret German intelligence information in return for cash payments.
Hans Peter Uhl, a leading conservative MP told Spiegel online: " It goes without saying that the [US] intelligence official responsible should leave Germany."
The intelligence services of the United States, Britain and France had hitherto been regarded as "friendly" to Germany. Their diplomatic and information gathering activities were exempted from surveillance by Berlin's equivalent of MI5 the Bundesnachrichtendienst or BND.
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But Mr de Maiziere told Bild that he was now not ruling out permanent German counter espionage surveillance of US, British and French intelligence operations His remarks were echoed by Stephan Mayer, a domestic security spokesman for Mrs Merkel's ruling Christian Democrats: "We must focus more strongly on our so-called allies," he said.
The plans for "friendly" power surveillance follow last week's unmasking and arrest of a 31- year-old BND agent who sold top secret German intelligence documents to US officials in return for payments of £25,000.
The double agent is reported to have simply emailed Berlin's American embassy and asked whether officials were interested in "cooperation". He subsequently downloaded at least 300 secret documents on to USB sticks which he handed to his American spymasters at secret location in Austria.
Chancellor Merkel interrupted a current trade visit to China on Monday to describe the scandal as a "very serious development". She added: "It is a clear contradiction of the notion of trustworthy cooperation". German politicians have been shocked that the Americans not only failed to report the "double agent" but effectively recruited him.
The new German counter-espionage measures would almost certainly result in the monitoring of "listening posts", which both the American National Security Agency (NSA) and its British equivalent, GCHQ run from the roofs of their respective Berlin embassies. Their existence was revealed at the height of another US-German spying scandal last year in which the NSA was found to have bugged Mrs Merkel's mobile phone.
Since the end of the Second World War, Germany has kept a so-called gentlemen's agreement on surveillance with the three western Allied powers of Britain, the United States and France which occupied then West Germany after 1945.
The established practice was that friendly nations should not spy on each other but rather cooperate and exchange information. However the practice may now be scrapped.
"When a friendly intelligence service breaks these rules, it commits the most serious breach of trust known to the world of espionage," commented Germany's Süddeutsche Zeitung newspaper.
The shadow is a moral problem that challenges the whole ego-personality, for no one can become conscious of the shadow without considerable moral effort. To become conscious of it involves recognizing the dark aspects of the personality as present and real. This act is the essential condition for any kind of self-knowledge.
Carl Jung - Aion (1951). CW 9, Part II: P.14