Wacky Snowden Haters Pile On The Bandwagon Claiming Snowden Is Somehow To Blame For Russia In Crimea

from the wtf dept

Tue, Mar 25th 2014 1:25pm — Mike Masnick

So, over the weekend, the NSA's chief external propagandist, Rep. Mike Rogers, made the ridiculous claim that Ed Snowden was somehow to blame for Russia's aggressive actions against Ukraine. It would appear that the usual crew of Snowden haters (who never seem to have any evidence beyond "hunches") have gleefully jumped onto that bandwagon, insisting that Snowden must be helping the Russians evade NSA surveillance. Based simply on (unproven) claims that the US intelligence community was somewhat taken by surprise by Russian moves in Crimea and Ukraine, folks like Joshua Foust and John Schindler -- both of whom have been leading the anti-Snowden conspiracy theories since about 3 seconds after Snowden was revealed -- are claiming that it's somehow obvious that Snowden must be working with the Russians to reveal the NSA's surveillance capabilities and how to get around them. Because apparently, Russian intelligence is so incompetent that they couldn't figure things out without the help of an American.

At best, these two seem guilty of quite an extreme form of confirmation bias. At worst, they seem to be pushing ridiculous conspiracy theories, based on absolutely nothing. The idea that Vladimir Putin and the FSB had to wait until Ed Snowden was effectively handed to them by the Americans pulling his passport (seems like Foust and Schindler conveniently forget that part...) in order to hide their plans to annex Crimea and get aggressive towards Ukraine seems positively unbelievable. However, it does show the extreme lengths some are willing to go to in order to smear Snowden based on no proof at all.

Update: Meanwhile, it appears that plenty of folks who actually work in intelligence say that Snowden has nothing to do with the events in Crimea.

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: crimea, ed snowden, john schindler, joshua foust, mike rogers, russia, ukrain

49 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

Anonymous Coward, 25 Mar 2014 @ 1:34pm

Given the revelations that have come out, this one, NSA missed what was going on in Russia because there are not enough hot chicks with webcams in the bedroom in Russia. Thjs is more likely the reason than Ed Snowden helping the Russians.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 25 Mar 2014 @ 1:37pm

I wonder when they are going to blame Snowden for MH370 going down due to him releasing classified documents this revelation made the pilots so angry about being tracked by GPS they tossed it out the window, but forgot the plane was pressurized .
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 25 Mar 2014 @ 1:43pm

Totally not important but I've always been curious, why does Mike Masnick always refer to him as Ed Snowden. It always jumps out at me because it seems like most news stories outside of techdirt refer to him as Edward.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 25 Mar 2014 @ 1:53pm

Seems to me that much of what is written here in support of Snowden is based on faith that he was telling the truth that only a select few journalists have any copies of what he took. The same can be said about the various types of documents that were taken.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Sambo, 25 Mar 2014 @ 1:54pm

It's quote sad however I am truly wondering how long it will be until one of these apologists (whackos) attempts to link Snowden to 9/11....
[ link to this | view in thread ]
kenichi tanaka (profile), 25 Mar 2014 @ 1:56pm

The playback in Washington when Democrats or Republicans want to blame someone is "Blame Snowden". You never hear of Democrats or Republicans taking responsibility for the messes that they create.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 25 Mar 2014 @ 1:57pm

It's all bullshit anyway. They knew what Russia was doing but just couldn't really do much about it without escalating things too high.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
MrWilson, 25 Mar 2014 @ 2:04pm

I've had a sinus infection for a few days. I thought I might have gotten it from someone at work who was sniffling and sneezing a lot, but now I think it might have been caused by Edward Snowden. He seems to have god-like powers to cause events that would otherwise be out of the control of a single human being, so yeah, he probably caused my sinus infection too.

Fear the demon-god Edward Snowden!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
edpo, 25 Mar 2014 @ 2:04pm

NSA Overreach is the Real Culprit
It's not Snowden but the NSA's massive overreach that is the real problem here. If the NSA had stayed within its original mandate and not tried to "collect it all" - domestically and internationally - then the NSA's "secrets" might have remained just that. If anyone is to blame for harming our national security, it's the NSA idiots who decided they'd rather collect everyone's data than just focus on national states and actual terrorists. They diluted their own effectiveness, to our detriment.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 25 Mar 2014 @ 2:04pm

Re:
A spy keeps his activities quiet, even after s/he has been outed, and the government receiving the documents also keeps quiet, they do not want the spied upon party to know what was taken, and then change their plans. A Whistle blower goes public with what they have, and what they are done, and their whole credibility relies on them telling the truth. Also the US government has admitted that what has come out is accurate, by their complaints that it hurts their abilities.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 25 Mar 2014 @ 2:06pm

Re:
They'd blame him for incidents that happened before he was even born.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 25 Mar 2014 @ 2:19pm

Re: Faith that Snowden speaks truthfully
You are correct, but misleading. Supposing that he is fully truthful about who has which documents, how would he prove it? Intelligence agencies routinely lie, so no one would believe it even if you got every intelligence agency on the planet to publicly state they never got anything from him.

Remember also that the first disclosures came out before his name was revealed, with his consent, by the journalists working on the project. If he wanted to defect and use this document dump as a parting shot, the way in which he released the material without a long term haven prepared seems like a very roundabout way to defect while maintaining deniability.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 25 Mar 2014 @ 2:30pm

let's be honest. the more that people can blame Snowden for, the less attention is being paid to the wrong doings they have been and are involved in. no one in their right mind would be able to blame him for anything apart from enlightening the World to what governments think of the people, ie, not a lot!!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 25 Mar 2014 @ 2:43pm

Damn you Edward Snowden, I'm out of toilet paper and trapped on the toilet.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Applesauce, 25 Mar 2014 @ 2:53pm

Malaysia Flight 370
I'm just surprised no one has (yet) made the connection between Snowdon and the Missing Malaysia Flight 370. I have a "hunch" he is responsible for the lost plane, so that proves it.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
That One Guy (profile), 25 Mar 2014 @ 3:15pm

And there's that arrogance and ego-centrism popping up again, the idea that no one could possibly figure out what the NSA was doing or how they were doing it unless directly told.

So if they're going to blame Snowden for the russians being able to 'evade their surveillance'(as opposed to simply realizing that russian intelligence isn't as stupid as they think they are), are they also going to blame him for Bin Laden as well?

After all, Bin Laden, as well as pretty much every major terrorist group has been going low tech for years, specifically to avoid agencies like the NSA, so unless they're going to claim that the terrorist groups can see the future, then obviously Snowden wasn't required for them to know how the spying agencies were going about their work, and how best to avoid them.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 25 Mar 2014 @ 3:19pm

Oh look at the green cat on the black grass! It's the Snowden effect I tell ya!

First Snowden says he doesn't have any documents in Russia. He gave them all to Greenwald. Snowden hasn't released any info as it has been hand picked by Greenwald to reveal. (with now the NYT and Washington Post adding to it). Greenwald has verified this and in addition said that Snowden didn't want all the documents released, especially those that would harm others. He wanted the misdeeds of these spying agencies revealed.

The steady drip of documents coming out, has been far more effective than the Wikileaks releases or the Manning document dump. The slow continual release has kept public attention on them, not allowing them to fade off into non-interest.

Those that have come out against Snowden have had about as much creditability as the agencies themselves. To hear a politician say it's because of Snowden tells you where the dishonesty is. Everything that has been released has proven truthful. Nothing in response to those leaks have proven to be truthful when they defend them. To me it just paints them all with the same brush. One you can't not believe.

Oh, and thank you TD for fixing that error message on posting. I had quit trying this morning.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 25 Mar 2014 @ 3:24pm

Snowden's whistle blowing was directly responsible for Hitler and the rise of the Nazi party. Don't ask how or why, just know that if it weren't for Snowden, we'd be living in a Nazi-free world right now.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
RD, 25 Mar 2014 @ 3:42pm

Re: Re:
"They'd blame him for incidents that happened before he was even born."

Yes, sort of like how Obama gets blamed for stuff that happened before he was even nominated for, let alone elected, president.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Mike Masnick (profile), 25 Mar 2014 @ 3:42pm

Re:
Totally not important but I've always been curious, why does Mike Masnick always refer to him as Ed Snowden. It always jumps out at me because it seems like most news stories outside of techdirt refer to him as Edward.

Snowden has always referred to himself as "Ed" starting in that video interview he did with Laura Poitras and Glenn Greenwald. Since it appears that he, personally, goes by Ed, we've always followed suit.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 25 Mar 2014 @ 4:14pm

Re:
More significant, in refuting that he is a Russian spy, the only reason he is in Russia is that the USA canceled his passport while he was in transit to south America.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
CyberKender, 25 Mar 2014 @ 4:41pm

It's not Snowden's fault.
It's clearly caused by the Olympics. Putin started his campaign against Ukraine because of the 2014 Winter Olympics, just like in 2008 when he attacked Georgia because of the Summer Olympics. Ban the Olympics and stop Putin!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Guardian, 25 Mar 2014 @ 4:41pm

@20
yet not only co ntinues but enhances and makes worse thus ensurng its more snowdens fault....
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Guardian, 25 Mar 2014 @ 4:43pm

@all above
go watch the TED show interview....he not only is CIA but he also mentions that americas lil bit about intellectual proprty he is in favor of....

the only way the system will fix itself is if you start dismantling all this IP law....it is now what is driving all the spying...

you wont fix it so you are all doomed....
[ link to this | view in thread ]
art guerrilla (profile), 25 Mar 2014 @ 6:04pm

Re: Re:
*that's* how sneaky he is ! ! !
i bet he set a virtual trip-wire so that he revoked his own passport ! ! !
he's the most diabolical spy since boris badinoff ! ! !

shit, the fucking spooks apologists should be thanking snowden, now, whenever shit goes down, they just point and screech (khan-like) S-N-N-N-O-O-O-W-W-W-D-E-E-E-N-N-N ! !!
its their get-out-of-jail-free card...

in other news, anon poster is either clueless or a bot...
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 25 Mar 2014 @ 7:17pm

To be fair, there was an epic failure of intelligence. Putin waltzed into Crimea like nothing happened and showed middle finger to Obama, who in turn ended up impotent. We will not know for decades what went wrong. Since Snowden, NSA spooks are watching their own backs at every turn, not sure what was compromised. Just think of thousands of suspended clearances, pending internal review. Internal havoc has contributed somehow, but indirectly.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
tek'a, 25 Mar 2014 @ 8:11pm

Re: Re:
It is actually surprising that all of those fact defieient complainers with their 'beliefs' have not defaulted to calling him Edward Joseph Snowden, which is obviously a way to suggest he is an insane murderer according to media usages.

Maybe calling him Comrade Edward Josephavitch Snowdeniski is next.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Zem, 25 Mar 2014 @ 9:05pm

It's all true. Snowden has used Russian money to build that time machine blueprint he stole and has gone back in time to make sure the Brittish now lose the 1853 Crimean war.

Don't believe me, check your history books! The Brits lost, while those of us who remember our true history know that Russia lost that conflict and was thrown from the Crimea for ever.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Ole Juul (profile), 25 Mar 2014 @ 11:18pm

Re:
They did escalate things too high, and that's why Putin was forced to move when he did.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Kronomex, 25 Mar 2014 @ 11:18pm

Snowden is the cause of global warming. All the hot air balloons and windbags in the CIA, FBI, NSA, and government in general are blustering so much that temperatures are rising and spreading all around the world. Naughty Mr Snowden.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Ole Juul (profile), 25 Mar 2014 @ 11:24pm

Re: Malaysia Flight 370
No one? OK, I'll give 'er a try: The 370 uses US tech and was backdoored by the NSA. Snowden knew the secret of how to remotely re-program and command the on-board controls. How's that? And I'm no even wearing my "hat" yet.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 26 Mar 2014 @ 1:59am

Re:
No, the NSA were supposed to know. That's their remit. But no, they don't give a shit about some pseudo-pinko Commie Nazis. They just want ALL OF TEH DATAZZZZZZ!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Andrew D. Todd, 26 Mar 2014 @ 2:25am

Naval Logic
Of Snowden's accusers, General Michael Hayden, at least, is supposed to be a professional soldier. God help any troops who come under his command in battle. Russia has a series of canals linking the Volga River to the Black Sea, to the Baltic Sea, and to the Arctic Ocean. These canals are deep and wide enough that they can handle a destroyer or a small submarine carried on a special barge. The route from the black Sea runs through the Straits of Kerch, just east of the Crimea, then through the Sea of Azov to Rostov-on-Don, and from there by canal. Since most of the Russian Black Sea coast has the Caucasus Mountains behind it, a most difficult place to build a ship canal, the Crimea Peninsula and the port of Sevastopol would be practically impossible to replace. When the Soviet Union broke up, Russia left troops behind in the Crimea to ensure its naval access to the Black Sea, and beyond that, to the Mediterranean, the Suez Canal, etc. When it became impossible to suborn the Ukrainian government any longer, it was inevitable that the Crimea would declare independence and become part of Russia. The Russians did not invade the Crimea, because they were already there, and had been for a long time. We are talking about plans which were laid down twenty years ago, when Edward Snowden was still a child. The policy of populating the Crimea with ethnic Russians goes back to Stalin, and even to the Tsars.

The Crimea is to Russia what Louisiana is to the United States, the gateway to the great river. In 1862, the American (Massachusetts) General Benjamin F. Butler landed in Louisiana with an invasion force, after the Navy, under Admiral Farragut, had obliterated the defensive forts at the mouth of the Mississippi, and the local elements of the Confederate Navy.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Ole Juul (profile), 26 Mar 2014 @ 2:43am

Re: Re:
I was thinking more of what that $5 billion was for.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
David, 26 Mar 2014 @ 3:35am

Re: Re: Re:
Yes, sort of like how Obama gets blamed for stuff that happened before he was even nominated for, let alone elected, president.

Like the Nobel Peace Prize?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
David, 26 Mar 2014 @ 3:43am

Re: NSA Overreach is the Real Culprit
It's not Snowden but the NSA's massive overreach that is the real problem here.

More like NATO's overreach. Gorbachev got promised that they'd stay off the Eastern block. He failed to get this in binding writing. Now the Ukraine was going NATO, cutting off Russia's access to the Black Sea.

Putin did not support Yanukovich out of love and vice versa. The alternatives were worse, and now he's dealing with them.

If the CIA were doing actual intelligence work rather than having their ears up everyone's ass, that would not have been all that hard to understand.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
David, 26 Mar 2014 @ 3:48am

Re:
that if it weren't for Snowden, we'd be living in a Nazi-free world right now.

Almost right. If it weren't for Snowden, you'd be able to believe living in a non-fascist country.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Niall (profile), 26 Mar 2014 @ 5:54am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
He got that for not being a) Bush, or b) Rethuglican.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Niall (profile), 26 Mar 2014 @ 5:57am

Re:
I was watching The Dark Knight Returns last night, which parodies 1980s obsessions with psycho-bullshit, where one bullshit artist, (sorry, 'psychologist') was saying that "Batman created the criminals, they were drawn in by his aura and so were realyl victims themselves". Seems like an element of this here too - obviously Manly Putin couldn't/wouldn't do anything wrong before Snowden 'enabled' him and 'corrupted' him....
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Niall (profile), 26 Mar 2014 @ 6:01am

Re: Re: Malaysia Flight 370
Snowden re-programmed the flight computer to fly the plane to Benghazi, but because the 0bummer fascist state is desperate to avoid even passing mention of that world-changing debacle where four whole Americans died (under a democRAT watch!) they virused the flight computer and the resulting conflict led to all passenger phones being bricked and the plane ending up in the Southern Indian Ocean also imitating a brick.

\WingNutDaily
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Niall (profile), 26 Mar 2014 @ 6:03am

Re: Re: Re:
I think you missed where both ACs were on Snowden's side?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Niall (profile), 26 Mar 2014 @ 6:05am

Re: Naval Logic
So they'd better not piss off the Turks, Egyptians or Brits... (Bosphoros, Suez, Gibraltar)
[ link to this | view in thread ]
edpo, 26 Mar 2014 @ 9:33am

Re: Re: NSA Overreach is the Real Culprit
"If the CIA were doing actual intelligence work rather than having their ears up everyone's ass, that would not have been all that hard to understand."
________________

That's what I was saying. The intelligence agencies are too overloaded with irrelevant data to spend time analyzing the data that matters.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 26 Mar 2014 @ 9:59am

Re: Re: NSA Overreach is the Real Culprit
Now the Ukraine was going NATO, cutting off Russia's access to the Black Sea.

Go look at a map, Russia has sovereignty over the east coast of the sea of Azov, and the east coat of the black sea from Crimea down to Georgia. It is a case of the wanted to keep the port facilities that they have built in Crimea.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
David, 26 Mar 2014 @ 10:12am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Fast forward to see that most people hate his guts these days for

a) his love of eavesdropping and three-letter agencies and his contempt for the constitution, oversight and whistleblowers
b) his basically unchanged adoption of Romneycare

Or, in short, for being
a) Bush
b) "Rethuglican"
[ link to this | view in thread ]
btrussell (profile), 26 Mar 2014 @ 6:10pm

Re:
@ $150 000 per infringement, not likely that he made very many copies. Russian Kopyright Kops would have been all over him before his visa was pulled.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Andrew D. Todd, 27 Mar 2014 @ 1:12am

Re: Re: Naval Logic
Well, you have to understand that Russia is an inland country. It doesn't have any really satisfactory ports or naval bases, such as the United States is blessed with. So it's rather a case of Hobson's Choice. During Russia's war with Georgia, in 2009, the Black Sea Fleet was able blockade the Georgian coast. Furthermore, Russia has proposals for direct gas pipelines running under the Black Sea and Baltic Sea, the so-called South Stream and North Stream pipelines. The idea is to be able to sell gas to Western Europe without paying Ukraine and Poland a percentage. Before Peter the Great, Russia's maritime access was confined to Archangel, up in the Arctic.

During the Second World War, the Germans enjoyed a monopoly of sea power in the Baltic up to the day of the surrender. They had gotten all the way up to the gates of Leningrad, or Petrograd, and, as they retreated, they took away all the ships, and destroyed all the port installations. The Russians would capture a port and find that they couldn't do much of anything with it for a couple of years.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
David, 28 Mar 2014 @ 7:48am

Re: Re: Re:
Don't give them ideas.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 29 Mar 2014 @ 4:40am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
Or, if you must, don't give them polysyllabic ones. They can't handle those, given the one (and only that I know of) they've chosen thus far.
[ link to this | view in thread ]