RT: The report also criticized the response of US intelligence to Snowden's revelations, saying it failed to review all of the documents he released thoroughly. Surely intelligence agencies are drilled in how to respond to such leaks?
RM: Well, that shows what we call the eunuch-ism. The House Intelligence Committee members are eunuchs... Apparently, they asked the CIA to do this, or the NSA to do this. [And the response was] "thanks very much, but we're not going to do that." Hello! This is overseership? So the so-called oversight committees of the Congress are not only complicit in approving this kind of thing, but they have become more properly called the "overlooked committees." They like to overlook these things. When push comes to shove here, and Ed Snowden says: "Look, I took this oath to defend the Constitution. I am going to do that, and to do that I have to expose these gross violations." He does it, and they all fall like a pack of wolves after him saying he's a "Russian spy." Give me a break! I thought that went out about three decades ago.
RT: US officials have focused more on Snowden's punishment, rather than what he actually revealed. Why has that been the case?
RM: It is quite simple. They make these charges about "grave damage" having occurred. It reminds me of Bradley Manning, Chelsea Manning now, when he or she released those documents on war crimes in Iraq, Afghanistan and all kinds of chicanery in the State Department, Robert Gates, the Head of the Department of Defense, came up and said: "This is awful. This endangers our troops. People are going to be get killed because of that." And the Head of the Senate's Armed Services Committee said: "Well, please give me a memo on that. I am interested in that." Six weeks later the memo came back signed by Gates, and it said: "Well, actually, our fears and our charges were significantly overwrought." What I see in this report are charges that are unsubstantiated, as well as significantly overwrought. Many of them are just petty little things that are shown on the record to be erroneous.
For example, they say that Snowden got out of the Army Special Forces training because he had shin splints. Oh my God! The army records show he fractures. He was on crutches when he was released. How can they falsify that? It is going to be in Barton Gellman's book. And Gellman has looked at this stuff now. He was one of the people who interviewed. And what he says is that this is contemptuous of fact. He knows these things. It wasn't shin splints, it was broken legs. That is petty kind of stuff that they are charging Ed Snowden of. And this business is about running into problems with the supervisors. Well, I know about that. Because one of his co-workers went to Forbes magazine and she said, "You know, I don't know if Edward Snowden did the right thing or not, but I really hate the character assassination because Ed was a terrific guy. He defended us when our managers came down hard on us for no good reason. He stood up for us." And now it's coming out that he was insubordinate with his bosses. Well, good for him if he was defending his co-workers.
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