ABC Updates
17 June 2020
2/ Radio NZ Podcast On NZ's
Spies
https://shorthand.radionz.co.nz/the-service-podcast/index.html This contains all sorts of fascinating material,
spread out over several episodes.
2a/ For example, that the NZ Security Intelligence
Service
spied on
serving MPs. The example given was
former Labour
MP Richard Northey
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/the-service/418609/sis-spied-on-labour-mp-richard-northey This
is not the first such revelation. See the subsection titled "Spying On
MPs A Step Too Far" (about
former Green MP
Keith Locke) in my article "SIS Spied On CAFCA For
Quarter Of A Century" in
Foreign Control
Watchdog 120 May 2009,
http://www.converge.org.nz/watchdog/20/06.htm). The
Campaign Against Foreign Control of Aotearoa (CAFCA) remains the only
group to have received its SIS file on it as an organisation (as
opposed to SIS files on individuals).
2b/ In another episode: "New Zealand has lost some of its independence
within the Five Eyes intelligence alliance and been "drawn in a lot
closer" to the US-led spy network, former Prime Mnister Helen Clark
says"
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/the-service/418642/nz-s-independence-from-five-eyes-has-slipped-helen-clark "I
think you're as independent as you want to be. I consider we were
independent in my time. I sense there's been a bit of slippage since
then, frankly. Cark said 'sources in officialdom' had told her New
Zealand had 'got a lot closer back in' and that could threaten the
country's independent foreign policy, which went right back to the
nuclear-free stance of the mid-1980s". This is a somewhat revisionist
claim by Clark (to put it very mildly), because there was no more
staunch supporter of Five Eyes and the Waihopai spy base than her
during her nine years as PM and Minister in charge of the spies. As
for NZ"s "independent foreign policy" - that myth is still being
peddled by Jacinda Ardern today.
That same episode of the
podcast also features
Sir Bruce
Ferguson, former Director of the NZ Government Communications Security
Bureau (GCSB), NZ's member agency of Five Eyes and the
operator of Waihopai. "Sir Bruce said he was plucked from
obscurity to study at a US war college at the height of the
anti-nuclear row. After he became GCSB director, he developed close
relationships with Five Eyes spy chiefs, even playing golf 'many
times' with the heads of the NSA, CIA and FBI. 'We had very good, very
strong relationships with all the personnel at the top. It was a very
personal relationship, actually, with dinner at private houses. I
would always be invited to their private houses for dinner with their
families'. Sir Bruce acknowledged there were often complaints - even
from 'friendly' countries - about Five Eyes tactics, such as
allegations that the NSA (US National Security Agency) had hacked
German Chancellor Angela Merkel's phone. 'All those complaints are
public knowledge. And that's the way of the world. Yes, anyone's fair
game if it's in your own national interests to look at them. And that
could be for economic reasons, or whatever', he said. 'There's one
very strong club: The Five Eyes. It's jealously guarded. It's looked
on very enviously by probably every other Western nation'. He said
people might ask why this group of five English-speaking countries was
special or unique.
'Well, they are
unique. End of story. And we should safeguard that'".
Not much mention of an "independent foreign policy" from Sir Bruce.
3/ What's That Antenna At
Waihopai That Looks Like A Toenail Clipping?
The Waihopi spybase is visually associated with two
big domes (which, temporarily, became one after the 2008 Domebusters'
action) which conceal the antennas inside from view. But since
2007 the base has also featured an uncovered antenna of a distinctive
shape. What is it and what does it do? It's called a Torus antenna and
it is capable of spying on 35 satellites at once. A good description
of such antennas globally, including at Waihopai, can be read and
viewed at
https://www.electrospaces.net/2015/04/torus-antenna-to-significantly-increase.html
Secretary/Organiser
Anti-Bases Campaign
Box 2258, Christchurch 8140, New Zealand
abc@chch.planet.org.nz
www.converge.org.nz/abc
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