The Outsourcing of The US National Security; The Verizon Files

Let us begin the journey from where it all started-as we found out today, with an employee of the federal government contractor firm Booz Allen Hamilton saying today that , “I can’t in good conscience allow the US government to destroy privacy”; the Verizon records story leaker, Edward Snowden, told the Guardian-which first broke the story few days ago.

So ironic, he destroyed by his action the privacy and confidence of millions of Americans and others in the US and elsewhere. But that was the tip of the iceberg, the problem is deeper than this 29 years old looking probably for a “quicky” and for his fame to flame. The problem resides in the US government and how it has been conducting business in the past few decades, how it outsourced America’s security to private companies looking to milk the federal government without at least shielding it with proper safeguards to protect it;  the US government, Corporations ‘bread giver’.

The story began when Snowden leaked that the US government through a secret program called PRISM asked Verizon after it obtained an order from a federal court, a secret court that handles national security issues, to provide it with daily records of calls in and outside the US. President Obama said that the leak did not affect Americans, not sure how, and that all branches of government were notified. 

He, Obama, even said that every member of Congress has been notified, few members disputed his account that every member was notified but all agreed, Democrats and Republicans that this program has been ongoing and it has been approved since President George W. Bush. 

It first took place after the attacks on America on 09/11/2001. But this story has other chapters, in other parts of the world involving outsourcing security and defense to non "uniformed" personnel that neither have the discipline, the proper training or the urgency to protect America’s interests although they are Americans.

In Afghanistan and Iraq, an outsourced defense and security firm by the name of ‘Blackwater’ has been involved in atrocities and even murders. The huge defense firm Halliburton has long been accused of overbilling the US government. 

What next, what is needed to be done here is a review probably to what constitutes national security, a survey of America’s needs in the next twenty years, and most importantly stopping this crazy campaign of sequestration-eliminating necessary federal spending, furloughing federal jobs and use it as a political bargain. In addition to naively cutting defense programs in a way that will compromise America’s ability to provide the backup support to its troops and missions. The problem is not Snowden, the problem resides in those who brought him on board, placed him with the CIA, provided him with access to the most secretive communications campaign and then cried wolf.

Image is courtesy of theweek.com

Originally posted in WSN on 06/10/2013

http://www.wespeaknews.com/politics/the-outsourcing-of-the-us-national-security-the-verizon-files-214423.html (Link Not Working)