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In reply to the discussion: Today, finally, Snowden was PROVEN a LIAR! [View all]KoKo
(84,711 posts)For NSA chief, terrorist threat drives passion to collect it all, observers say
Alexander frequently points out that collection programs are subject to oversight by Congress as well as the U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, although the proceedings of both bodies are shrouded in secrecy. But even his defenders say Alexanders aggressiveness has sometimes taken him to the outer edge of his legal authority.
Some in Congress complain that Alexanders NSA is sometimes slow to inform the oversight committees of problems, particularly when the agencys eavesdroppers inadvertently pick up communications that fall outside the NSAs legal mandates. Others are uncomfortable with the extraordinarily broad powers vested in the NSA chief. In 2010, he became the first head of U.S. Cyber Command, set up to defend Defense Department networks against hackers and, when authorized, conduct attacks on adversaries. Pentagon officials and Alexander say the commands mission is also to defend the nation against cyberattacks.
He is the only man in the land that can promote a problem by virtue of his intelligence hat and then promote a solution by virtue of his military hat, said one former Pentagon official, voicing a concern that the lines governing the two authorities are not clearly demarcated and that Alexander can evade effective public oversight as a result. The former official spoke on the condition of anonymity to be able to talk freely.
Alexander himself has expressed unease about secrecy constraints that he says prohibit him from fully explaining what the NSA does. But just as in Iraq, he remains fiercely committed to the belief that we need to get it all, said Timothy Edgar, a former privacy officer at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and at the White House.
The NSAs 5,000-acre campus at Fort Meade in suburban Maryland contains more than 1,300 heavily guarded buildings and an array of computers and gadgetry sometimes described as the most wonderful electronic toybox in the world. But even before his arrival there in 2005 as director, Alexander was regarded as a leading apostle for harnessing technologys awesome power in the service of national security.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/for-nsa-chief-terrorist-threat-drives-passion-to-collect-it-all/2013/07/14/3d26ef80-ea49-11e2-a301-ea5a8116d211_story_1.html