![\"Cia-lobby-seal\"](\"http:\/\/www.globalresearch.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/Cia-lobby-seal-400x321.jpg\" "\\"Cia-lobby-seal\\"")
<\/div>\nBy Andre Damon
\nGlobal Research<\/p>\n
With increasing frequency, aggressive foreign policy moves by Washington have been palmed off by the media and political establishment as defensive responses to \u201chacking\u201d and \u201ccyber-espionage\u201d by US imperialism\u2019s geopolitical adversaries: Russia and China.<\/em><\/p>\n For months, news programs have been dominated by hysterical allegations that Russia \u201chacked\u201d the Democratic National Committee in order to subvert the 2016 election. As the print and broadcast media were engaged in feverish denunciations of Russia, the US and its NATO allies moved thousands of troops and hundreds of tanks to the Russian border.<\/p>\n Not content to allege interference only in the American election, the US media and its international surrogates have alleged Russian meddling in elections in France, Germany and other far-flung countries. Prior to the current furor over Russian \u201chacking\u201d of the election, the Obama administration used allegations of \u201chacking\u201d and \u201cintellectual property theft\u201d to justify the trade sanctions and military escalation against China that accompanied its \u201cpivot to Asia.\u201d<\/p>\n Whenever the State Department, the CIA or unnamed \u201cintelligence officials\u201d proclaim another alleged \u201ccyber\u201d provocation by Washington\u2019s geopolitical rivals, news anchors breathlessly regurgitate the allegations as fact, accompanying them with potted infographics and footage of masked men in darkened rooms aggressively typing away at computer keyboards.<\/p>\n But the official narrative of a benevolent and well-intentioned US government coming under attack from hordes of Russian and Chinese hackers, spies and \u201cinternet trolls\u201d was upended Tuesday with the publication by WikiLeaks of some 9,000 documents showing the methods used by the Central Intelligence Agency to carry out criminal cyber-espionage, exploitation, hacking and disinformation operations all over the world.<\/p>\n The documents reveal that the CIA possesses the ability to exploit and control any internet-connected device, including mobile phones and \u201csmart\u201d televisions. These tools, employed by an army of 5,000 CIA hackers, give the agency the means to spy on virtually anyone, whether inside or outside the United States, including foreign governments, \u201cfriend\u201d and foe alike, as well as international organizations such as the United Nations.<\/p>\n The WikiLeaks documents expose the United States as the world\u2019s greatest \u201crogue state\u201d and \u201ccyber criminal.\u201d The monstrous US espionage network, paid for with hundreds of billions in tax dollars, uses diplomatic posts to hide its activities from its \u201callies,\u201d spies on world leaders, organizes kidnappings and assassinations and aims to influence or overturn elections all over the world.<\/p>\n On Tuesday, former CIA director Michael Hayden replied to the revelations by boasting, \u201cBut there are people out there that you want us to spy on. You want us to have the ability to actually turn on that listening device inside the TV to learn that person\u2019s intentions.\u201d<\/p>\n One can only imagine the howls of indignation such statements would evoke in the American press if they were uttered by a former Russian spymaster. In his comments, Hayden barely attempts to cover up the fact that the United States runs a spying and political disruption operation the likes of which Russian President Vladimir Putin or Chinese President Xi Jinping could only dream of.<\/p>\n The WikiLeaks documents show that the United States seeks to cover up its illicit operations by planting false flags indicating that its geopolitical adversaries, including Russia and China, bear responsibility for its crimes.<\/p>\n Cybersecurity expert Robert Graham noted in a blog post, for example, that<\/p>\n \u201cone anti-virus researcher has told me that a virus they once suspected came from the Russians or Chinese can now be attributed to the CIA, as it matches the description perfectly to something in the leak.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The revelations have already begun to reverberate around the world. German Foreign Ministry spokesman Sebastian Fischer said Wednesday that Berlin was taking the revelations \u201cvery seriously,\u201d adding, \u201cissues of this kind emerge again and again.\u201d Meanwhile Germany\u2019s chief prosecutor has announced an investigation into the contents of the documents, with a spokesperson telling Reuters,<\/p>\n \u201cWe will initiate an investigation if we see evidence of concrete criminal acts or specific perpetrators\u2026We\u2019re looking at it very carefully.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The documents expose the CIA\u2019s use of the US consulate in Frankfurt, Germany as a base for its spying and cyber operations throughout Europe, employing a network of intelligence personnel including CIA agents, NSA spies, military secret service personnel and US Department of Homeland Security employees. Many of these operatives were provided with cover identities and diplomatic passports in order to hide their operations from the German and European governments.<\/p>\n Wednesday\u2019s rebuke by the German government followed the revelations in 2013 by Edward Snowden that \u201cunknown members of the US intelligence services spied on the mobile phone of Chancellor Angela Merkel,\u201d as Germany\u2019s top prosecutor put it in 2015.<\/p>\n The US media, true to its function as a propaganda arm of the CIA and other intelligence agencies, immediately sprang into action to minimize the significance of the revelations and to accuse Russia, entirely without substantiation, of having released the documents in an effort to subvert US interests.<\/p>\n NPR quoted favorably the statements of Hayden, who declared, \u201cI can tell you that these tools would not be used against an American,\u201d while the\u00a0Washington Post<\/em>\u00a0quoted a bevy of security experts who said there is nothing to worry about in the documents. It favorably cited one such \u201cexpert,\u201d Jan Dawson, who declared, \u201cFor the vast majority of us, this does not apply to us at all \u2026 There\u2019s no need to worry for any normal law-abiding citizen.\u201d<\/p>\n Such absurd statements, made about a security apparatus that was proven by Snowden\u2019s revelations to have spied on the private communications of millions of Americans, and then lied about it to the public and Congress, were taken as good coin by the US media.<\/p>\n Just one day after the WikiLeaks revelations, the media spin machine was already busy portraying them as part of a Russian conspiracy against the United States, and indicting WikiLeaks for acting as an agent of foreign powers. \u201cCould Russia have hacked the CIA?\u201d asked NBC\u2019s evening news program on Wednesday, while another segment was titled \u201cCould there be a [Russian] mole inside the CIA?\u201d<\/p>\n The types of spying and disruption mechanisms revealed in the documents constitute a key instrument US foreign policy, which works to subvert the democratic rights of people all over the planet in the interest of US imperialism. No methods, whether spying, hacking, blackmail, murder, torture, or, when need be, bombings and invasion, are off the table.<\/p>\n