Forewords from Nicky Hager's book _Secret Power_:
Once upon a time life was easy for the intelligence community.
Michael Joeseph Savage made a mark in the sands of history with his
`where Britain stands we stand' declaration. It was only right that
we saw the world through British eyes and, when Britain retreated,
only sensible that we should go all the way with LBJ as an Australian
Prime Minister (in whose memory a swimming pool in Melbourne was
named) once declared. The cold war kept us in line and on line.
In the mid-1980s we bucked the system. We may have been ahead of
our time on matters nuclear, but we were out of step with what was
called the `Western Alliance'. It took a break with the United States
and Britain to make the people of New Zealand aware that we were part
of an international intelligence organisation which had its roots in a
different world order and which could command compliance from us while
withholding from us the benefits of others' intelligence.
Life at the time was full of unpleasant surprises. State-sponsored
terrorism was a crime against humanity as long as it wasn't being
practiced by the allies, when it was studiously ignored. In the
national interest it became necessary to say `ouch' and frown and bear
certain reprisals of our intelligence partners. We even went the
length of building a satellite station at Waihopai. But it was not
until I read this book that I had any idea that we had been committed
to an international integrated electronic network.
It was with some apprehension that I learned Nicky Hager was
researching the activity of our intelligence community. He has long
been a pain in the establishment's neck. Unfortunately for the
establishment, he is engaging, thorough, unthreatening, with a
dangerously ingenuous appearance, and an atonishing number of people
have told him things that I, as Prime Minister in charge of the
intelligence services, was never told.
There are also many things with which I am familiar. I couldn't
tell him which was which. Nor can I tell you. But it is an outrage
that I and other ministers were told so little, and this raises the
question of to whom those concerned saw themselves ultimately
anwserable.
It also raises the question as to why we persist with the old order
of things. New Zealand doesn't have much in common with Major's
Britain and probably less with Blair's Britain. Are we
philosophically in tune with Clinton's USA? Is he?
Does all of that prejudice our new orientation to Asia?
There will be two responses to this book. One will take the easy
course of dumping on Hager. He is quite small and can easily be
dumped on. The other will be to challenge the existing assumptions
and to have a rational debate on security and intelligence. I have
always enjoyed taking the easier course but we may have been the
poorer for it.
David Lange
Prime Minister of New Zealand 1984-89
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The world of signals intelligence is one that governments have
traditionally tried to keep hidden from public view. The secrecy
attached to it by the United Kingdom and its allies in the Second
World War, particularly codebreaking operations, carried over into the
Cold War. Whether their adversaries were attacking them with weapons
or diplomatic strategies, the concern was the same --- that
revelations about methods and successes would lead an adversary to
change codes and ciphers and deny the codebreaker the ability to read
the foe's secret communications.
Another aspect of the Second World War that carried over into the
Cold War era was the close co-operation between five countries --- the
United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand
--- formalised with the UKUSA Security Agreement on 1948. Although
the treaty has never been made public, it has become clear that it not
only provided for a division of collection tasks and sharing of the
product, but for common guidelines for the classification and
protection of the intelligence collected as well as for personal
security.
But over the last 50 years, codebreaking has become far more
difficult, and often impossible --- due to the use of computer based
encryption. At the same time, the interception of unencrypted
communications (for example, air-to-ground communications) and other
electronic signals --- particularly radar emanations and missile
telemetry --- has grown dramatically in importance. This expanded
role for signals intelligence was made evident in the construction and
operation of a vast networkof ground stations spread across the world,
aircraft equipped with intercept antenna patrolling the skies (and
sometimes being shot down), and eventually the launch of eavesdropping
satellites. This activity did not escape the notice of the Soviet
Union, which also was busy establishing its own elaborate network. It
also became very evident to outsider observers that signals
intelligence was an important and very expensive part of the Cold War.
That signals intelligence became more noticeable did not, for many
years, alter the attitudes of the authorities about the necessity for
strict secrecy. In the United States, the National Security Agency,
established in 1952, was officially acknowledged only in 1957. For
years, what were well known to be US operated signals intelligence
stations have been officially described as facilities engaged in the
research of `electronic phenomena' or the `rapid-relay of
communications.' It took the US over 20 years after the Soviet Union
obtained detailed information on a US signals intelligence satellite
even to acknowledge the existance of such satellites. Other nations
have been equally reticent --- the very existance of Canada's
Communications Security Establishment was first revealed by the media
in 1975.
In recent years some of the UKUSA governments have been somewhat
more forthcoming about signals intelligence sometimes with regard to
historical events, sometimes with respect to organisation structure,
and sometimes about some aspect of current operations. But secrecy is
still intense (although no more than in other countries). What the
public does know, it knows largely because of the efforts of
industrious researchers who have collected and analysed obscure
documents and media accounts, and interviewed present and former
intelligence officers who can shed light on signals intelligence
operations. These researchers have included Desmond Ball in
Australia, James Bamford in the United States and Duncan Campbell in
the United Kingdom.
Nicky Hager's _Secret Power_ earns him a place in that select
company. Indeed, he has produced the most detailed and up-to-date
account in existance of the work of any signals intelligence agency.
His exposé of the organisation and operations of New Zealand's
Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) is a masterpiece of
investigative reporting and provides a wealth of information.
The reader of Mr Hager's book will learn about not just New
Zealand's signals intelligence activities, but those of its partners.
Specifically, the reader will learn about the origins, the evolution,
and internal structure of the GCSB; the Tangimoana and Waihopai ground
stations and their operations; New Zealand's role in the UKUSA
alliance, and some of the signals intelligence operations of the other
UKUSA nations. _Secret Power_ also serves as a fascinating case study
of the role of a junior partner in an intelligence alliance.
Some, undoubtedly, will object to the unprecendented detail to be
found in the book, taking the traditional view that secrecy is far
more important than public understanding of how tax dollars are being
spent on intelligence. Certainly, revelations that defeat the purpose
of legitimate intelligence activities are unfortunate and waste those
tax dollars. But the UKUSA governments and their intelligence
services have been far too slow in declassifying information that no
longer needs to be secret and far too willing to classify information
that need not be restricted. A Canadian newspaper made the point
rather dramatically a few years ago --- after being denied access to a
Canadian signals intelligence facility, the paper promptly purchased
on the open market, and published, a satellite photograph of the
facility, and its antenna system, first obtained by a Soviet spy
satellite.
There are many individuals within the services who would prefer
greater openness, but they frequently cannot overcome the intense
opposition of those preaching the need for tight secrecy. The
internal bureaucratic battle to get information declassified can be a
long and intense one and those opposing disclosure have an advantage
--- often they are those in charge of security, who have developed a
mindset which views any revelation as damaging. In the meantime, the
public is kept in the dark. A free press, as manifested in books such
as Mr Hager's, is large step towards alleviating the problem.
Jeffrey T. Richelson
Alexandria, Virginia
May, 1996
Jeffrey Richelson is a leading authority on United States
intelligence agencies and author of _America's Secret Eyes in the
Sky_ and co-author of _The Ties That Bind_.
