07/27/16

What Does Putin Have on Hillary?

By: Cliff Kincaid | Accuracy in Media

Andrew Rosenthal of The New York Times examines the question of who hacked the Democratic National Committee and whether the trail leads to Russian President Vladimir Putin. “We know from reliable reporting that Russian hackers are not independent actors, and that they have been busy,” he writes. “And it’s eerie, at best, that Julian Assange’s WikiLeaks chose this moment to release the stolen emails (and complete a strange triangle that runs from him to Putin to Edward Snowden).”

For his part, on his Twitter page, Snowden said, “If Russia hacked the #DNC, they should be condemned for it. But during the #Sony hack, the FBI presented evidence.”

This is funny on Snowden’s part. Snowden sits in Russia, a guest of Putin, and Assange has acted like an agent of Russia. Trevor Loudon’s report on Assange documents his service to Moscow and associations with a number of Marxist or pro-Russian groups. Snowden is probably personally involved in the leak and could easily get to the bottom of why it happened.

“This has the appearance of a foreign power directly interfering in an American election, and that’s not something to take lightly,” Noah Rothman writes in Commentary. He goes on, “Rather than applaud and leverage this development, as he has, Donald Trump would be much better served by condemning it. If the Russians are set on undermining the Democratic Party in this election, it won’t be long before the public is asked to consider why that might be.”

Rothman has a point, but the more important issue is why the DNC and then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton used private or unsecure servers that were open to these foreign adversaries. One can argue that Mrs. Clinton, in particular, invited this foreign meddling in the election. Who knows what the Russians still have in their bag of tricks? The point is that Mrs. Clinton is a security risk and the Russians may still have emails to use against her.

Pro-Putin commentator Don Hank reported back in June, “I was invited to participate in a conversation among a group of friends who are hoping that the Kremlin will turn over their cache of Hillary emails obtained via the Romanian hacker ‘Guccifer’ just in time to smear her prior to the November election.”

Even earlier, Catherine Herridge of Fox News reported back in May that the Romanian hacker known as “Guccifer” had claimed he easily—and repeatedly—breached former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s personal email server in early 2013. The Clinton campaign denied the charge, but Herridge reported that “Guccifer” said “he first compromised Clinton confidant Sidney Blumenthal’s AOL account, in March 2013, and used that as a stepping stone to the Clinton server.”

“Guccifer” has been indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of wire fraud, unauthorized access to a protected computer, aggravated identity theft, cyberstalking and obstruction of justice.

Mrs. Clinton’s emails may be even more valuable than the documents stolen and released by Snowden. After all, Clinton’s emails discussed the intentions of U.S. policymakers.

This is actually an old story involving the Clintons. As Reed Irvine and I reported back in 1998, the Ken Starr report on President Clinton revealed that Clinton had warned his sexual plaything Monica Lewinsky, a White House intern, “that a foreign government may be monitoring their telephone conversations and that they should concoct a cover story to explain them.” Here is exactly what the Starr report says about this matter: “According to Ms. Lewinsky, she and the President had a lengthy conversation that day. He told her that he suspected that a foreign embassy (he did not specify which one) was tapping his telephones, and he proposed cover stories. If ever questioned, she should say that the two of them were just friends. If anyone ever asked about their phone sex, she should say that they knew their calls were being monitored all along, and the phone sex was just a put-on.”

Nothing has really changed, except that emails have now been monitored and compromised in Mrs. Clinton’s case.

As we said back in May, “The evidence demonstrates that she is a full-blown security risk who should be indicted for her reckless criminal conduct as Secretary of State.” Hillary made herself into a security risk.

Now we are waiting for the next shoe to drop. Does it have something to do with Bill Clinton, the Clinton Foundation, or Hillary’s own personal scandals?

Whatever the scandal, it’s not the fault of Donald J. Trump. Trump may have something to explain regarding his own ties to the Kremlin, but so does Hillary. If the truth doesn’t come out before Election Day, it means that Moscow may have blackmail power over the possible first female president of the United States.

Cliff Kincaid

Cliff Kincaid is the Director of the AIM Center for Investigative Journalism and can be contacted at [email protected].View the complete archives from Cliff Kincaid.

05/20/15

Mike Morell Attempts to Repair His Damaged Credibility

By: Roger Aronoff
Accuracy in Media

Mike Morell, the former Deputy CIA Director and Acting CIA Director, is out with a new book, and has been making the rounds on virtually every TV network. This is supposed to be his time to set the record straight, but he has apparently decided not to do that. Instead, his truthful revelations are mixed in with obvious falsehoods, so it becomes difficult to distinguish one from the other.

We noted his difficulty with the truth back in this 2014 column by former CIA officer Clare Lopez, in which she cited, among other things, that Morell and then-UN Ambassador Susan Rice met with several Republican senators about the editing process that the Benghazi talking points had gone through before Rice used them on the five Sunday morning shows, just days after the attacks in Benghazi that resulted in the deaths of four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens. Lopez, in her column titled “Benghazi and the Politicization of Intelligence,” wrote:

Under questioning from the senators about the talking-points editing process, Morell tried to blame the FBI for cutting the reference to al-Qa’eda terrorism; he said the FBI didn’t want to compromise an ongoing criminal investigation. When Graham called the FBI and told them what Morell had said, ‘they went ballistic,’ Graham said in an interview with Fox News. ‘Confronted with this, Morell changed his statement and admitted that he, and the CIA, had been responsible after all.’

Although Morell has made statements undermining Hillary Clinton and President Obama on other intelligence issues, he is actively assisting both the mainstream media and the Obama administration in an effort to ignore and revise the 2012 events in Benghazi with his new book The Great War of Our Time.

“One of the most striking aspects of Morell’s chapters on Benghazi is his dogged insistence that the attacks were simply the result of a mob spinning out of control,” writes Steven Hayes for The Weekly Standard. “But Morell maintains that the attacks were not planned and claims, repeatedly and bizarrely, that the attackers did not necessarily want to harm Americans.”

This, Hayes notes, does not match the Abu Khatallah indictment, which contends that the objective of the attackers in Benghazi was to “kill United States citizens at the Mission and the Annex.”

A Defense Intelligence Agency email, obtained by Judicial Watch and made public on May 18, shows that the DIA reported on September 16, 2012 that the terrorist attack had been planned 10 or more days prior by Al Qaeda.

“The memo was copied to the National Security Council, the State Department and the CIA,” reports Catherine Herridge of Fox News. “A third DIA memo, dated Oct. 5, 2012, leaves no doubt that U.S. intelligence agencies knew that weapons were moving from Libya to Syria before the attack that killed four Americans.”

Morell refused to comment on the flow of weapons to Syria during his recent Fox News interview with Bret Baier, host of Special Report. Morell’s carefully crafted chapters on Benghazi, a total of 47 pages, deceive so systematically and so completely as to create an entirely false account of these events. He seeks to rewrite history by contradicting other witnesses. All evidence supporting this scandal that is not ascribed to the White House’s stonewalling efforts is reduced to spurious claims or myths.

But it is his word against those on the ground that night—from Gregory Hicks to the former Libyan president, including the security contractors and diplomatic security agents. Morell’s own account is irredeemably sullied by the fact that he won’t even admit to conversations he’s had concerning the CIA’s Benghazi talking points.

“I told my colleagues that I had some concerns about the talking points and that I knew other agencies did as well,” he writes of his controversial participation in a Deputies Meeting. “I did not say what my concerns were. I concluded by saying I would edit the talking points myself and share them with the relevant deputies before sending them to the Hill. McDonough simply said, ‘Thank you, Michael.’” McDonough is Denis McDonough, then-Deputy National Security Advisor, now White House Chief of Staff.

Contrast this with email records obtained by Judicial Watch, and you find that Morell’s assertions prove entirely false. “On the SVTS [call], Morell noted that these points were not good and he had taken a heavy editing hand to them,” states an administration email from September 15, 2012. “[Morell] noted that he would be happy to work with Jake Sullivan and Rhodes to develop appropriate talking points. McDonough, on Rhodes’ behalf, deferred to Sullivan.” Rhodes is Ben Rhodes, former Obama speechwriter, Deputy National Security Advisor, and brother of David Rhodes, the president of CBS News.

“It was agreed that Jake would work closely with the intelligence community (within a small group) to finalize points on Saturday that could be shared with HPSCI [House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence],” it continues.

In order for there to be an agreement, there must first be a conversation involving multiple parties. And the details of this email clearly demonstrate that there was more of a discussion with others than Morell would like to admit.

But the mainstream media aren’t interested in asking Morell about his factual inaccuracies or contradictions.

During a Q&A, Michael Hirsh of Politico asked Morell a softball question on Benghazi, saying, “You say the CIA reevaluated its security posture in Benghazi after that but it’s unclear why State did not do more. Can you explain?”

This approach revealed that Hirsh hadn’t done any independent research, and was hoping that the Benghazi scandal could be “explained” away by the most authoritative—and, in this case, incredibly biased—administration source.

Politico also published an article by Morell, which claims to be “The Real Story of Benghazi.”

Hirsh’s question doesn’t even reflect Morell’s actual statements. “It was only …after the tragedy of 9/11/12…that we learned that only a few security enhancements had been made” at the Special Mission Compound, writes Morell.

Members of the Annex Security Team write in their book, 13 Hours: The Inside Account of What Really Happened in Benghazi, that status updates between them (at the CIA Annex) and the Special Mission Compound (located about one mile from the Annex) occurred “usually every Friday.” Does Morell really expect his readers to believe that these two facilities, located so close together, were not aware of each others’ security efforts? Hirsh apparently does.

By informing his readers about unreleased video footage from the night of the attack at the Special Mission Compound (SMC), Morell seeks to establish himself as a first-hand expert on what happened there. He is not. But because the video footage is not available to others, it is impossible to independently verify the facts.

For Politico to have taken Morell at his word without fact-checking is no better than citing anonymous administration officials.

“Some of the attackers were armed with small arms; many were not armed at all,” Morell writes. “No heavy weapons were seen on the videotape.” This contradicts another account, from the book Under Fire: The Untold Story of the Attack in Benghazi by Fred Burton and Samuel M. Katz, which maintains that “Some of the attackers carried RPGs [rocket-propelled grenades] slung over their shoulders, apparently to be used on the armored doors of the safe haven and the TOC [Tactical Operations Center] or to repel any counterattack. The DS [Diplomatic Security] agents knew they were facing superior firepower.”

“…definitely, it was planned by foreigners, by people who—who entered the country a few months ago, and they were planning this criminal act since their—since their arrival, said former Libyan President Mohammed al Magariaf on September 16, 2012 on CBS’ Face the Nation.

But, according to Morell, this is merely a “myth,” a false perception “that the attacks were well organized, planned weeks or even months in advance.”

“What’s more, the failure to anticipate and prevent such attacks would be, by definition, an intelligence failure,” writes Steven Hayes. Such a failure would reflect badly on the CIA, and therefore Morell himself.

Morell contends that there was no tactical warning for the attacks. Instead, “We routinely sent such cables each year on the anniversary of 9/11—but we did want our people and their US government colleagues to be extra vigilant.”

“Be advised, we have reports from locals that a Western facility or US Embassy/Consulate/Government target will be attacked in the next week,” reads the warning described in 13 Hours.

Morell recounts the stand down order with as much dishonesty as his description of the secret Deputies Meeting. “While these calls were being made, the response team was frustrated that it was not moving out,” he writes. “Although the delay was no more than five to eight minutes, I am sure that to those involved it must have seemed like forever.” But, he writes, it wasn’t ordered by anyone up the chain of command and was totally justified.

Morell’s account doesn’t even address whether the security team left with CIA Chief of Base “Bob’s” blessing or otherwise. They did not. And, according to the 13 Hours account, at least 20 minutes “had elapsed since the operators had first mustered at Building C.”

In a firefight, 20 minutes can be an eternity. AST Member Kris Paronto told Fox News’ Bret Baier last year that, without the delay, “Ambassador Stevens and Sean [Smith], yeah, they would still be alive, my gut is yes.”

Admitting as much would concede the CIA’s role in the overall dereliction of duty. Yet Nick Romeo writes for the Christian Science Monitor that although “it’s clear that he wants to defend the reputation of the agency” Morell has credibility because he notices “the many weaknesses and flaws in the design and function of intelligence agencies.”

However, when it comes to the death of four Americans—where it counts—Morell perpetuates the cover-up.

After leaving the CIA in 2013, Morell joined Beacon Global Strategies, started by Hillary Clinton’s “principal gatekeeper”—as described by The New York Times—Philippe Reines. The company serves as a sort of Clinton government-in-waiting. Thus, Morell’s statements become even that much more suspect due to a conflict of interest, while trying to protect Hillary Clinton’s bid for the White House.

And the dereliction of duty could have been prevented. Chief of Base “Bob” had already been given an opportunity to see the February 17 Martyrs Brigade’s lack of action earlier that year when they failed to come to the aid of another operator and Tyrone Woods during an altercation with a group they believed to be Ansar al Sharia. Woods himself later became a September 11, 2012 casualty. Even the Accountability Review Board notes that on the day of the attacks, the militia “had stopped accompanying Special Mission vehicle movements in protest over salary and working hours.”

But it is easier to ignore and marginalize the Benghazi scandal than for journalists to do independent research. Case in point, CNN’s Christiane Amanpour interviewed Morell on May 13 about ISIS and the Osama bin Laden operation, but did not ask him about his false Benghazi narrative.

If Morell has so transparently lied about the death of four Americans and the resulting administration cover-up, why, exactly, should the media trust him on other matters?

05/18/15

US Intel knew about weapons going from Benghazi to Syria

From Hot Air:

And quite a bit more, including the potential for ISIS to rise to seize ground and declare a caliphate. In a memo from the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) to the National Security Council, the CIA, and the White House five days after the attack on the consulate in Benghazi, the DIA concluded that the attack had been planned for more than a week and was retribution for an American drone strike that had killed a senior al-Qaeda leader in June 2012. Moreover, the attack had been planned for the anniversary of 9/11 as a propaganda coup for AQ and its affiliate behind the attack, and not just a coincidence as the White House later claimed (via The Right Scoop):

The date of the DIA conclusion (produced by a FOIA lawsuit from Judicial Watch) is remarkable for at least one reason. First, September 16 is an infamous date in the Benghazi timeline, as the date on which Susan Rice did a full Ginsburg to insist that the attack resulted from a spontaneous demonstration tied to an obscure YouTube video. Even though the DIA directly contradicted those talking points supplied by the White House to Rice, they continued to insist on using them for another two weeks, including Hillary Clinton. During that period, the Obama administration kept saying that they had no indication that this was a terrorist plot, even though the president of Libya insisted that it was a planned attack on one of the same shows on which Rice appeared.

As Catherine Herridge and Martha McCallum point out, the memo tells a lot more of the story than we knew before. The consulate and its intelligence operation nearby was keeping an eye on weapons transfers to anti-Assad forces in Syria, one of the proposed reasons why the US would have kept a consulate open in that city for so long. This was taking place at the same time that a number of American politicians were demanding more open support for rebels in Syria, a move that had support from Hillary Clinton and Leon Panetta at the time according to Panetta’s memoir, but which Obama himself was reluctant to embrace — publicly, at least. Mike Morell insisted last week that the US took no part in that weapons movement, but did we need a consulate just to conduct passive intel on arms trafficking?

Why keep up the pretense? Obama was in the middle of an election, and didn’t want to acknowledge that he’d been caught with his pants down. And he may well have wanted to avoid answering questions about secret arms programs to anti-Assad rebels, especially given how that turned out in Syria and Iraq.

Speaking of which, the part about the rise of ISIS is even more interesting. The DIA tried to warn Congress about the threat in January 2014, which is when Obama compared them to the “jayvees.” Sixteen months before that, the DIA had predicted exactly what would happen with the group formerly known as al-Qaeda in Iraq, right down to their declaration of a caliphate in the area that the US had fought so hard to wrest from their control in 2006-8. This memo makes it look as though both Obama and Clinton made a habit of getting caught with their pants down, and concocting cover stories when the failures became too obvious to ignore.

Fox: Newly released Benghazi documents show Obama admin lied about attack

Smoking gun! Hillary knew of Benghazi attack 10 days in advance

04/11/15

Injury In the Line of Duty…or not?

By: T F Stern
T F Stern’s Rantings

When an individual puts on a uniform in the service of his community or country, either as a fireman, police officer or military serviceman we recognize the uniform perhaps more than the individual. If they get injured while in our service it’s our moral duty to take care of them.

An article at the Fox News website by Catherine Herridge, Fort Hood shooting victim denied benefits, despite Purple Heart decision pointed out that a military board has denied benefits to a soldier who was shot during the Ft. Hood terrorist attack.

You may recall the Obama administration pressured the military into calling the shooting “work place violence” rather than classifying the shooting as a terrorist event “even though the evidence showed Hasan was emailing the Al Qaeda cleric Anwar al-Awlaki prior to the attack”.

But that’s not all…the administrators of our military, those charged with looking after our servicemen who put the uniform on each day in defense of our nation took it a step further.

“MAJ Hasan has been charged with criminal activity, but has not been adjudicated a terrorist. Therefore, the clear preponderance of evidence does not support that the injuries sustained were the direct result of armed conflict,” the letter said.

I wonder what planet these administrators are from; really! Getting shot six times isn’t the result of armed conflict? Must have been one heck of a game of Tidily Winks those soldiers at Fort Hood were playing.

Putting aside whether or not the injuries were the result of an attack carried out during war time, on foreign soil or our own should not matter… shouldn’t a member of our military be taken care of if he/she fell off a loading dock while pealing potatoes assigned to KP duty? (I know, soldiers no longer are required to perform KP; pick some similar mundane chore like slipping down on a wet floor while cleaning the head)

There you go, soldier; we don’t have to pay for your injuries because you can’t prove they happened as an act of war. Chew on that for a while …

Of course there are two sides to every coin; taking into account the numerous attempts to feign injury in order to collect a fat Workman’s Compensation package. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.

A friend of mine worked for the U.S. Postal Service as a criminal inspector. One of his jobs was investigating individuals who were collecting disability from the government, folks suspected of being less than honest about their injuries. He told me about folks who claimed they were too injured to work collecting full benefits that showed up each month in their mail box. The only problem was these folks were fit as a fiddle and off working ‘cash jobs’ that went as unreported income when they were supposed to be at home in their sick bed.

I wish there were more inspectors catching free loaders; but that goes against current policy under the Obama administration. Truth be known, I think there are bonuses set aside for the more creative free loaders.

Talk about free loaders and spending taxpayer money, what about this?

“The director of the Philadelphia VA regional benefits office was paid $288,000 in “relocation payments” to move the 140 miles from Washington, D.C. to her new home last year”.

{…}

“Federal regulations allow for the reimbursement of relocation expenses including the “costs of house-hunting, moving, terminating leases, and a per-diem rate for meals and temporary housing for an employee and his or her family,” the spokesman said.”

I’m so happy to know the VA administrators are able to take care of themselves; but isn’t their job to take care of military personnel who need medical treatment? (Sounds like they have their priorities messed up)

Moving right along…

I remember one police officer who fell out of his chair at the station and collected full disability benefits for about a year; that’s full pay with benefits, tax free because it was carried as Injury on Duty. (not making this up folks; this actually happened)

Back in the 70s an off duty uniformed Houston Police Officer was injured while working traffic at the Astrodome, an extra-job where his salary was furnished by the Astrodome. Long story short; he was seriously injured by a vehicle while working traffic; but the City denied his request for Injury on Duty status.

The City of Houston claimed that at the time of his injuries his actual employer was the Astrodome and refused to pay while he was out of work. Eventually the courts convinced the City of their responsibility because the officer was directing traffic and wearing a uniform which represented his authority, authority which could only be given by the City of Houston.

More recently another Houston Police Officer, Jason Roy, survived a roll over accident during a chase. His promised benefits have been denied after being disabled with a broken neck, making him unable to perform as a police officer.

‘“The City of Houston is cooperating fully and is not contesting Officer Roy’s medical condition. The case is moving through the process dictated by the state. The next scheduled hearing will occur in mid-November. The decision as to whether benefits are granted is made by the Worker’s Compensation Division of the Texas Department of Insurance, not the city,” city of Houston Director of Human Resources Omar Reid.”

This means there’s a bureaucrat stationed somewhere along the chain of command to deny benefits; either at the City, State or Federal level of government. Somebody is employed in a position of authority to ignore benefits promised, ignore right from wrong and to limit final responsibility in favor of saving the taxpayers money.

I would hope our military service men and women would be treated better; but our government is run by folks who have lost their compass as to what’s right and wrong. Injury on Duty means nothing to administrators and bureaucrats whose sole purpose in life is to screw over those who’ve earned these benefits.

02/17/15

Suit Seeks Financial Damages from Snowden Inc.

By: Cliff Kincaid
Accuracy in Media

A federal lawsuit has been filed against the Oscar-nominated movie “Citizenfour,” which features NSA defector Edward Snowden and celebrates his theft and release of classified documents. Snowden and his associates are being sued for financial damages for providing aid and comfort to America’s enemies.

Filed on behalf of a retired naval officer who saw the film and took offense at Snowden’s illegal activities, the suit says Snowden and his associates have participated in “a scheme to profit from stolen U.S. government property” and have no right to the money generated by the film. Snowden, who has been charged with espionage and is currently living in Russia, makes regular appearances via video to his supporters in the U.S. He spoke, for example, to a Koch Brothers-sponsored International Students for Liberty conference on February 13.

The “Citizenfour” film has already been shown in theaters, is up for an Oscar at the Academy Awards on Sunday night in the “documentary” category, and is then scheduled to air on the HBO cable channel the night of Monday, February 23.

The suit alleges that the film “glorifies international espionage for profit” and that Snowden’s “dissemination of top-secret documents to foreign enemies” has “seriously damaged” U.S. national security, putting the lives of Americans at risk. Information included in the complaint (Exhibit A) also alleges that the film is not eligible for an Oscar nomination because its entry violates the rules for documentary awards.

While the lawsuit has generated some interest from outlets like The Hollywood Reporter, it has not garnered the national press attention it deserves. Yet, the lawsuit has a very strong factual basis. It cites the 1980 precedent of Snepp vs. United States, in which a former CIA officer was denied the right to gain a profit from a book based on information obtained and then released to the public, in violation of his standard secrecy agreement.

Like Snepp, Snowden violated a secrecy agreement. What’s more, it has been reported that Snowden stole highly classified “Tier 3” documents about ongoing NSA operations. The NSA is part of the Defense Department and its mission is to support military men and women as they fight America’s foreign enemies.

The lawsuit shines a light on how Snowden’s disclosures have put our citizens, military personnel and allies in danger.

Snowden’s disclosures have been blamed for enabling the Russians to conduct a surprise invasion of Ukraine, and for the Islamic State terror group, also known as ISIS, to unexpectedly grow in power and strength in the Middle East. Former CIA officer Robert Baer has said, “…ISIS has been reading Snowden…they know to stay off phones, stay off e-mail and the rest of it. They’re communicating with mobile Wi-Fi. They can beat the National Security Agency…”

In addition to Snowden, defendants in the lawsuit include his collaborator Laura Poitras, the director of “Citizenfour,” and the Weinstein Company, which is distributing the film in the U.S.

To attempt to rectify the damage done to U.S. foreign policy, the lawsuit seeks the establishment of a “constructive trust” to hold the funds generated by the film. The suit argues that a trust would enable the government “to obtain an accounting of all monies, gains, profits, royalties, and other advantages that all Defendants have derived, or will derive in the future, from the publication, distribution, sale, serialization, or republication in any form, including any other rights, of the work entitled ‘Citizenfour,’ whether or not such gains remain in Defendant Snowden’s possession or in the possession, custody or control, whether direct or indirect, of any other Defendant herein.”

The lawsuit was filed on behalf of Horace B. Edwards, a patriotic retired naval officer and former Secretary of the Kansas Department of Transportation. Edwards is also a former president of both a pipeline and an engineering company.

His local newspaper, the Topeka Capital-Journal, quotes him as saying that he went to watch the film and soon realized that it was celebrating illegal activity that hurt the United States. Edwards said he had a security clearance while working for the government and would never think of disclosing secret documents. He contacted a local attorney, Jean Lamfers, a former journalist, to bring the legal action.

“Plaintiff Edwards views Defendant Snowden’s acts as dishonorable and indefensible and not the acts of a legitimate whistleblower,” the lawsuit says.

The defendants have argued that their activities are protected by the First Amendment, and that Edwards doesn’t have the standing to sue.

As previously noted by Accuracy in Media, “Citizenfour” shows Snowden in Hong Kong, China, after arranging through encrypted messages to meet his collaborators and disseminate his stolen NSA documents. We argued that the film describes what amounts to an espionage operation to damage America and our allies. Snowden fled from China to Russia, where he is under the control of the Russian secret police, the FSB.

Because of the damage inflicted by Snowden and his associates, the suit anticipates that “hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars” will be needed “to protect human assets placed at risk, restore/revamp computer infrastructure, rebuild relationships with foreign governments, and respond to various enemies’ resurgence efforts, due to the blowback associated with the film and the release of classified information to foreign enemies of this Nation.”

A similar estimate has also been made by former CIA officer Baer, who said about Snowden, “…this guy has done more damage to U.S. intelligence than I’ve seen anybody do. And he’s gone way beyond…protecting privacy of Americans…It’s going to cost us billions.”

Catherine Herridge, chief intelligence correspondent for the Fox News Channel, noted in December of 2013, “A review of the NSA leaks by Fox News shows the majority of the leaks since June now deal with sources, methods and surveillance activities overseas, rather than the privacy rights of American citizens.”

We commented at the time that the evidence showed that Snowden “stole NSA documents and leaked them for the express purpose of weakening America’s defenses against terrorism.”

The lawsuit highlights the financial nature of the Snowden operation, and how he and his associates stand to make millions of dollars from undermining U.S. national security.