[HN Gopher] Spain expels two US spies for infiltrating secret se...
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Spain expels two US spies for infiltrating secret service
Author : hunglee2
Score : 201 points
Date : 2023-12-09 08:46 UTC (14 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (english.elpais.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (english.elpais.com)
| fimdomeio wrote:
| The most astounding statement is this: "What do Americans have to
| pay for if we give them everything they ask for?" they noted.
| These sources insist that Spain openly collaborates with the
| United States, and always exchanges information. According to
| these sources, the number of times in which Spain has refused to
| share information of interest to Washington is "between one and
| zero."
|
| Either this is a lie, the USA and Spain have zero competing
| interests, Spain absolutely ignores it's own laws and regulations
| or Spain gave up on being an independent country. I can't imagine
| a world where the USA shares everything with Spain, so I can't
| image why would Spain share everything with the USA.
| throwbadubadu wrote:
| > why would Spain share everything with the USA.
|
| Wishful (respectively forceful) thinking :)
| refurb wrote:
| How would the USA know that Spain is sharing everything
| unless they checked?
| collaborative wrote:
| Spain is largely a vassal state of the US but also of Germany.
| As such, it depends on these countries for most of its
| intelligence. It would be counter productive for Spain to
| refuse cooperation given its membership of EU and NATO. Spain
| is on the firing line of NATO's "enemies" because of its
| relatively weak state, so it would be very audacious of Spain
| to betray its masters. Spain's political class certainly
| wouldn't have the appetite for it
| orwin wrote:
| > Spain is largely a vassal state of the US but also of
| Germany
|
| Wow, such a claim? Germany, really? Do you have evidence?
| morelisp wrote:
| The 2009 Euro debt crisis made it clear that Spain has
| little economic autonomy even when Germany's demands are,
| economically speaking, insane.
| generic92034 wrote:
| So (for example) Portugal was able to choose a non-
| austerity strategy to get out of the GFC while Spain was
| coerced by Germany to follow an austerity strategy? If
| that is what you mean, could you please provide any kind
| of evidence for that coercion? What makes Spain special
| in that regard (e. g. compared to Portugal)?
| tgv wrote:
| Nothing. Spain had a real-estate bubble, and it
| collapsed.
| morelisp wrote:
| The main reason I think it played out differently is that
| Portugal is considered more united in its other political
| views than Spain. Even in Portugal the 2015 election that
| ended (sort of) the austerity policies was highly
| contentious/fractious. Madrid could not tolerate that
| kind of clusterfuck without also risking e.g. Catalonian
| independence. Related to that Portugal also does not have
| the other half Spain does, the US political backing which
| works in tandem with the German economic power.
|
| That said, if you listen to German politicians they still
| don't believe Portugal is out of the GFC and would
| reinstitute austerity there in a heartbeat given the
| chance.
| generic92034 wrote:
| I am still missing any evidence Germany exerted any
| pressure in that regard. It would be different for
| Greece, obviously.
|
| > That said, if you listen to German politicians they
| still don't believe Portugal is out of the GFC and would
| reinstitute austerity there in a heartbeat given the
| chance.
|
| If you listen to the larger parties of the current German
| government they would like to "modify" the
| "Schuldenbremse" (self-inflicted limitation on debt,
| fixed on constitutional level) to be able to raise more
| debt. And even in the conservative party the respect for
| austerity is declining along with the financial well-
| being of the German federal states.
| pas wrote:
| I guess there's a huge difference between raising funds
| (selling bonds) to fund domestic projects and sending it
| to other EU states as "aid", no?
| generic92034 wrote:
| I am not quite sure what you are hinting at. Could you
| please clarify?
|
| The only large-scale aid Germany is providing to other EU
| countries I am aware of are their (internally not
| disputed) EU contributions. But if I remember correctly
| Spain is not a large net receiver from those
| contributions either (barely a net receiver). Also,
| Germany could not change that without leaving the EU, so
| I am not sure how that would be any leverage.
| pas wrote:
| I mean the realpolitik of increasing the EU budget,
| currently for the aid for Ukraine. (If I'm not mistaken.)
|
| Back after 2009 the whole discourse was about bailing out
| the southern banks, of course not via direct aid, but via
| ECB operations, standing up various credit/emergency
| facilities, basically anything that leads to more gross
| EU credit risk (or risk sharing).
| rewmie wrote:
| > Either this is a lie (...)
|
| It don't think there is any doubt that it was a bald-faced lie.
| The comment reads like a puerile feign of ignorance.
| H8crilA wrote:
| It's cheap propaganda for internal purposes. Everyone spies on
| everyone. Like there are, IDK, Czech Republic spies in the US.
| Discovery of "friendly" spies is handled gracefully - no one
| gets killed, no one gets jumped in a back alley by unidentified
| perpetrators, and no one even goes to prison. That is assuming
| you don't turn the spies around to work for you.
|
| I don't get it why this is on HN, it is not particularly
| significant and it is definitely not related to tech.
| mettamage wrote:
| I mostly agree with your comment.
|
| However, HN isn't only about tech. HN is about fascination
| for the world from a scientific angle. Most on HN are
| techies, so that explains its tech bias.
|
| "anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity." [1]
|
| "Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, or
| celebrities, _unless they 're evidence of some interesting
| new phenomenon._"
|
| ^ This does not justify the current topic that strongly. It
| does justify the fascination for the world from a science
| perspective angle. It also corroborates your part about
| stating it's not particularly significant.
|
| For me, the good faith view of all of this IMO is that having
| a discussion about friendly states spying on each other with
| this crowd is interesting enough.
|
| [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| threeseed wrote:
| But there is nothing new or intellectual about this.
|
| Expelling diplomats is about as minor and inconsequential
| event as you can get.
| avar wrote:
| > Spain absolutely ignores it's own laws and regulations.
|
| Which regulation would those be? The GDPR and similar laws
| explicitly exclude state intelligence agencies and the like.
|
| > I can't imagine a world where the USA shares everything with
| Spain, so I can't image why would Spain share everything with
| the USA.
|
| Spain can assume the US has sufficient resources to know
| anything it cares to anyway, and Spain doesn't have an empire
| spanning the globe. The US does. One party has a lot more to
| lose by revealing everything.
| wkat4242 wrote:
| > and Spain doesn't have an empire spanning the globe
|
| Anymore :)
|
| I mean it's important to realise that once they did have just
| that and that mindset might carry on today.
| askonomm wrote:
| It certainly does carry on. Same in France.
| onli wrote:
| Why do you think that? Germany didn't even protest when it was
| revealed that the USA spied on the phone of chancellor Merkel,
| the BND sent siphoned german internet traffic to the NSA in an
| act of treason, and flight passenger data is sent to the USA
| without receiving such data in return. And again and again the
| EU enables data transfer programs into the USA, even though it
| is known the USA does not protect that data from access and
| that thus all such agreements are illegal.
|
| In such questions, European states repeatedly bow completely to
| the USA. I don't see why it would be different with Spain.
| cheese_van wrote:
| How do you mean protest? Do you mean people in the streets?
| No, that didn't happen.
|
| Do you mean inter-governmental protest in the form of
| summoning an ambassador and dressing them down? In the form
| of sternly worded demarches asking for clarification? In
| diplomatic discussions that frankly announced our
| relationship was injured? Yes that very much happened. A
| relationship was impaired and Germany was quite
| diplomatically clear about it.
|
| Diplomatic protest does not need to be public to be
| effective.
| onli wrote:
| You are correct. I indeed remembered that not even the
| ambassador was summoned, but according to
| https://www.dw.com/de/nsa-sp%C3%A4hangriff-us-botschafter-
| ei... at least that did happen.
| hash872 wrote:
| Countries spy on each other constantly, it's just that
| articles about the US doing so receive far more clicks.
| Europe does a similar amount of spying on the US, here's a
| couple articles where it's revealed or they admit it:
|
| France admits they spied on the US:
| (https://www.france24.com/en/20131024-nsa-france-spying-
| squar...)
|
| Germany was found to be spying on the US:
| (https://www.dw.com/en/german-intelligence-spied-on-white-
| hou...)
| krisoft wrote:
| > Either this is a lie, the USA and Spain have zero competing
| interests, Spain absolutely ignores it's own laws and
| regulations or Spain gave up on being an independent country.
|
| Or the spy chiefs in the USA know exactly what they can ask
| from their Spanish counterparts and how so they avoid asking
| things the Spanish cannot legally fulfill.
|
| For example the USA can ask for Spanish defense information,
| which the Spanish agencies share with them since they see
| themselves playing on the same team. The USA can ask for
| information on criminals and terrorist and non-affiliated spies
| operating in Spain, which Spain shares with them since they are
| playing in the same team. And presumably the USA is wise enough
| to not ask for compromat on Spanish leaders or things which
| undermine legitimate Spanish business interests.
|
| > or Spain gave up on being an independent country
|
| If you want to put it that bluntly. Have you heard the term Pax
| Americana? This is how it looks like from the ground up.
| Countries have the choice of being aligned with America (in
| which case they receive various boons) or not (in which case
| they receive pain and suffering in all kind of diffuse ways).
| Countries (and individuals in the countries) then make the
| rational choice. If you want to be crass about it you can
| describe it as giving up on being an independent country. In
| reality it is more like they accept to colour inside certain
| lines to achieve a greater prosperity for themselves.
|
| Things like they can build regular weapons, but they can't aim
| those weapons at the USA, or they can't sell those weapons to
| unaligned countries.
| germandiago wrote:
| USA is supporting Morocco and Morocco has had a long problem
| with Sahara and claims for Ceuta and Melilla, spanish cities.
| Also they want to take over at some point Canary Islands.
|
| Americans are playing two faces here: Spain is our friend and
| at the same time they are supporting Morocco.
|
| It is not nice IMHO. Last year after more than four decades of
| Shara conflict between Morocco and saharauis the soanish
| government suddenly changed position for this topic with zero
| explanation. Something government knows most citizens are
| against. I think americans forced Spain to do it.
|
| On the way we had a conflict with Algeria, which is who
| provided us with cheap gas. It is a stupid movement forced from
| outside.
|
| At the same time, Israel normalized relations with Morocco,
| putting an embassy there. And now they are in Sahara mining...
|
| Is this all by chance? I doubt it. It is all planned. Against
| our own interests.
|
| Pure geopolitics.
| MomoXenosaga wrote:
| It's because of immigrants. Look on a map. Morocco is
| promising to stop African migrants and take back their own.
| Has nothing to do with America.
| germandiago wrote:
| Yes, our american friends just forced that move for Sahara
| and just did this:
| https://www.elespanol.com/mundo/africa/20231208/marruecos-
| co...
|
| Who do you think sold that to our neighbours? No, they are
| playing two decks and harming us on the way.
|
| I do not have anything against americans per se, but they
| have a big responsibility on what happened in Europe lately
| and they are also playing two decks there for many reasons
| I won't explain here now, but Nordstream/Germany's russian
| gas is one of the topics, if not _the_ topic.
|
| Anyway, I prefer to leave it here and comment more about
| other news, particularly technology, which is what I enjoy
| the most.
|
| Feel free to reply, I just do not want to start a long
| thread about this since it is inside HN policies to talk
| about these topics the less the better :)
|
| Thanks for your exchange.
| OfSanguineFire wrote:
| Have you ever traveled in Western Sahara, on both sides of
| the berm? Especially over a span of time that would allow you
| to witness the changes that have occurred in the region's
| demography? The indigenous Saharawi population is so small
| now it could hardly form a viable state, especially one able
| to resist migrant flows from further south. As the other
| poster said, European states' foreign policy now is strongly
| driven by migration concerns. Yes, the marginalization of the
| Saharawi from their own region is a result of Morocco's
| occupation, and that can be lamented, but the damage is
| already done.
| spaniard89277 wrote:
| It's clear for many spaniards that the US is playing against
| us. The whole deal with Algeria, Morocco and Israel is pretty
| shady to say the least.
|
| I don't have our secret services in high regard, but I expect
| them to at least do something to defend our interests.
| skwirl wrote:
| >I can't imagine a world where the USA shares everything with
| Spain, so I can't image why would Spain share everything with
| the USA.
|
| I'm sure it's not everything, but it's certainly asymmetric
| given that Spain (like any NATO country) outsources much of its
| security to the United States.
| tejohnso wrote:
| > or Spain gave up on being an independent country.
|
| This doesn't seem all that unlikely, for certain contexts at
| least.
| kelnos wrote:
| Isn't this pretty much an open secret? Doesn't everyone spy on
| everyone else, even when they're nominally allies?
|
| It's telling that Spain merely expelled these people, rather than
| locking them up and/or torturing them for information. I'm sure
| there's some sort of gentlemen's agreement that this is what you
| do when you catch an ally's spies.
| threeseed wrote:
| Yes everyone spies on each other. It's why embassies largely
| exist these days.
|
| The only reason you would expel someone is if it was overly
| egregious.
|
| Not sure what it is particularly special about this event.
| toyg wrote:
| _> The only reason you would expel someone is if it was
| overly egregious._
|
| Or if the two parties are in a tit-for-tat situation of some
| sort. There might be some diplomatic sabre-rattling going on,
| on some other topic.
|
| Also, more often than not you don't expel anyone because 1)
| it reveals the reach of your intel skills, and 2) it removes
| the capability to feed misinformation to the other party.
| germandiago wrote:
| There must be IMHO. For these things what you usually have is
| an arrest as a minimum yet they let them go.
|
| On top of that it was made public.
|
| Spain is turning at this moment, btw, in a dictatorship and I
| am not exaggerating. I am spanish.
|
| I am figuring out what to do and whether to leave or not. I
| have my family here so that's what keeps me here. Otherwise I
| would have left already.
| toyg wrote:
| _> Spain is turning at this moment, btw, in a dictatorship _
|
| Seems a bit of a hyperbole for "Spain is under a fragile
| minority government".
|
| By that metric, the UK is a dictatorship in most years.
| HPsquared wrote:
| Funnily enough, that word has been used to describe the UK
| system in particular.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elective_dictatorship
| vvillena wrote:
| The Spanish right wing establishment isn't comfortable when
| not confidently in power, either by directly being in
| power, or by being sure whoever is in power wouldn't dare
| to change course on certain policies. This has been an
| issue for a long long time. The only new development is the
| emergence of a strong far right wing party, which seems to
| have driven the moderate right wing party away from the
| center, emboldening their statements to the point of
| hyperbole or further.
|
| The current Spanish government is a very fragile minority,
| but it was voted by 7 out of 9 party groups in Congress
| (that is everyone except the right wing and far right
| parties), and the executive power has people from five
| different parties. Quite exotic for a dictatorship indeed.
| germandiago wrote:
| You are obviating the "Ley d'Honnt" which basically
| overrepresents minorities. They have disproportionate
| representation.
|
| A regional party can have like 6-8 times more
| representation than a national one with the same amount
| of votes nominally speaking.
|
| It is legal, but makes no sense, more so taking into
| account that independentist parties are forbidden in
| Portugal or France and that here they not only are
| allowed (I can agree with that), on top of that they can
| oresent themselves to the national parlament and do
| national politics when their interest is to break the
| system (I do not agree with that).
|
| The law for overrepresentation was done to not smash
| minorities. However, what is happening is the exact
| opposite: minorities are driving the majority of people
| instead. Which is even worse and a privilege of a few
| over most.
| vvillena wrote:
| Taking stats from the past elections, the most voted
| party got 39% of the seats with 33% of the votes, and the
| second party got 34.5% of the seats with 31.7% of the
| votes. The third and fourth most voted parties got 9.4%
| and 8.8% of seats with a similar 12.4% and 12.3% of
| votes. These are all national parties, and it's well
| known that D'Hondt seat assignment reinforces the most
| voted parties and punishes everyone else, because the
| amount of seats in contention on most voting districts is
| too small. Regional parties have it easier because all
| their votes are in a small amount of regions, but this
| doesn't mean they are overrepresented: the percentages of
| votes and seats match quite well, with some parties being
| a bit above and others being a bit below. This is because
| within their regions, these parties are not minorities,
| so D'Hondt doesn't punish them. The one concession the
| Spanish system gives to regional parties is a better
| chance to form their own parliamentary group (important
| for debate time when discussing laws).
|
| Anyway, I agree that having 50 general election districts
| (one per province) results in skewed votes. This was done
| by design as an attempt to have an easier-to-control two
| party system, and enshrined in the Spanish constitution,
| so it's not easy to change. It's probably easier to
| change provinces themselves than the constitution in the
| current political climate. For instance, merging all
| provinces in each region together would solve most issues
| with the voting system, as it would increase the amount
| of seats in contention.
|
| Regarding the argument about this being a government by a
| minority of people: the parties that voted for the
| current government represent roughly 50.5% of the total
| votes. The current opposition parties represent 45.6% of
| total votes.
| germandiago wrote:
| I agree with you in everything here except in one:
| putting infinitely heterogeneous groups with different
| interests from Teruel to Canary islands and left and
| right wing independentists from all areas with different
| interests and forgiving crimes for the ambition of
| governing does not look to me like the best formula for
| peace and stability.
|
| Any midly-responsible governor would have, no matter how
| much some people dislike it, fone a deal between PSOE-PP.
|
| I do not vote myself BUT this is what looks more
| sensible, political tendencies apart, for stability: only
| two homogeneous groups that represent a big amount of the
| population. Even if I do not feel represented myself.
| AshamedCaptain wrote:
| D'Hondt, I guess you mean, is not a method to introduce
| distortion of representation, but precisely a method _to
| reduce distortion_ in parliamentary systems with
| imperfect representation to begin with (i.e. with
| circumscriptions). The distortion is primarily coming
| from something else other than d'Hondt, e.g. electoral
| circumscriptions being too large or too small.
|
| > taking into account that independentist parties are
| forbidden in Portugal or France and that here they not
| only are allowed
|
| This is not true at all. Search for corsican auto-
| determination. France actually has even allowed auto-
| determination referenda for DOMs in the very recent past.
| Certainly it's not exactly the same and I'm
| oversimplifying (many simply want to get rid of these
| regions), but please stop pointing fingers to France; you
| may realize we are not as different from Spain as you
| think.
| toast0 wrote:
| > on top of that they can oresent themselves to the
| national parlament and do national politics when their
| interest is to break the system (I do not agree with
| that).
|
| It is a far better outcome to seperate through political
| means than by uprising.
| gafage wrote:
| >The Spanish right wing establishment isn't comfortable
| when not confidently in power, either by directly being
| in power, or by being sure whoever is in power wouldn't
| dare to change course on certain policies.
|
| Could say exactly the same about the socialist party. Or
| any other party, really.
|
| Also: the party that you call right wing is as
| progressive as the socialist party. They have never done
| and will never do any change that is not progressive.
| Last time they were in power they raised taxes, did
| nothing to the homosexual marriage, abortion, and
| domestic violence laws, etc etc.
| germandiago wrote:
| And to add to this: the "far right" party is just plain
| right wing conservatives. Not far right. I am amazed
| nowadays how, not only in Spain, but in Dpain more so,
| they call almost everything "far right".
| david-gpu wrote:
| If a party is the one most conservative and most
| authoritarian in parliament, it is completely fair to
| describe it as "far right". What else could it be? In
| order to be "plain right" you would need a party
| _further_ to the right in parliament.
|
| They may not seem extreme to some people, but that only
| says something about the political leaning of those
| people.
| germandiago wrote:
| > If a party is the one most conservative and most
| authoritarian in parliament, it is completely fair to
| describe it as "far right"
|
| This is a matter of perception. Far right is isually
| (literature) described as right, violent and collectivist
| (facist) wing. Which by the way is quite similar to
| communism, just with a couple principles changed if you
| analyze it seriously from individual vs collective
| rights. How "far right" is used in Spain and a lot of
| media is not like that at all. Far right is Espana 2000
| and Democracia Nacional.
|
| > They may not seem extreme to some people, but that only
| says something about the political leaning of those
| people.
|
| Again, that is your perception. Your perception comes
| from the status quo, and seems reasonable from a social
| point of view. However, when the media uses a term
| incorrectly and politically so often, then it loses its
| meaning.
|
| That is why it is a good thing to know what we have in
| front of us and call it by its name. Otherwise all words
| end up losing their meaning. Far right is often not what
| most media calls far right by standard literature terms.
| Maybe by propaganda terms. But even Popular Party or
| Ciudadanos was tagged as far right sometimes. That's just
| the political tagging game.
|
| I'd rather see what parties propose rather than
| qualifying them as something. I think it is more useful
| for everyone.
| pvaldes wrote:
| If this is a dictatorship then is a very peculiar one, with
| the power more split than never in the entire democracy.
| Literally tens of political parties sharing power in the
| government. Any of them could let fall the "dictator" at
| any time.
|
| Either this is the opposite to dictatorship, or maybe we
| will need to redefine a lot of classical democracies with
| most power concentrated in one party at a time.
|
| About the right, they only can blame themselves. Is very
| ironic that they are blaming everybody for the same own
| situation what they, and only they, could have been stopped
| at any time. They didn't even tried to play. Choose to stop
| breathing instead.
|
| And don't make me start talking about the Donana's national
| park fiasco. Probably one of the most stupid right party
| plots to assure to lose voters weeks before an election.
| germandiago wrote:
| I think you only look at the chamber.
|
| You know there are three powers in a state right? Pedro
| Sanchez has more power now than the old socialist party
| or PP with qualified majority (mayoria absoluta) ever had
| because he made all institutions his particular home at
| his very service. Violating the most basic ethic rules.
| AshamedCaptain wrote:
| > Pedro Sanchez has more power now than the old socialist
| party or PP with qualified majority (mayoria absoluta)
| ever had because he made all institutions his particular
| home at his very service
|
| These arguments are empty. The GP was claiming "Pedro
| Sanchez" has extremely little power as it is on a
| minority government and seemingly one of the smallest
| ones in the history of his party, all verifiable facts.
| You counterargue by claiming that he is making all
| institutions dance at his tune. This is a circular
| argument. How does he exactly get the power to make
| "institutions his particular home at his very service" if
| he has the least power to do so, _even less power_ than
| on his previous term?
|
| I find it ridiculous that from all angles this looks like
| an absolutely powerless and extremely fragile do-nothing
| coalition (as some of the self-determination parties are
| as right-wing as they get, and therefore unlike to allow
| him to do anything even remotely left-wing), which looks
| to be disintegrating as we speak (if the news from my
| country are to believed), and yet at the same time I read
| claims of a "dictatorship". What is it that you see that
| apparently no one else in the world does?
| jfernandezr wrote:
| Spanish here. You're overtly exaggerating, Spain is not
| becoming a dictatorship. This is the right and far-right
| having a tantrum because they've not been able to secure a
| government. Go spread your propaganda elsewhere.
| gafage wrote:
| That's a bit of an over-simplification of what actually
| happened these weeks. Or a tremendous over-simplification,
| rather.
|
| Not that I really care about the outcome (two parties
| could've won, and they are both progressive, so I will be
| unhappy either way), but the methods have crossed a few red
| lines.
| alfonsodev wrote:
| might be an over-simplification but is right. Every year
| there are "indultos" (pardons?) happening, the famous
| Aznar's ones[1], and Rajoy's infamous "aministia
| fiscal"[2] but I guess is only now when it's convenient
| to push that narrative, no protests whatsoever for the
| other cases.
|
| Amnistia for tax evaders, it is democracy.
|
| Amnistia for those protesting making a performance-like
| referedum (everyone knew it would not actual effect),
| that's not democracy.
|
| It's a logic that I can not comprehend, I only can
| explain it if you consume so much mass media that you
| actually believe everything that is thrown at you.
|
| [1] https://www.eldiario.es/catalunya/gobierno-aznar-
| indulto-dia....
|
| [2] https://www.eldiario.es/economia/rato-franco-
| narco-100-benef...
| gafage wrote:
| It's not the same when you do it because you need it to
| be the president.
|
| I don't agree with pardons; it's something that simply
| shouldn't exist in this day and age. It doesn't matter to
| me what brand of progressivism does it.
| germandiago wrote:
| I am a close relative of a judge. I have asked plenty of
| non-media questions to get an idea of how our system
| works, should work and what does not work and did not for
| a long time (and now we have problems because the
| situation changed).
|
| By the way, I am not against independence FWIW. It is
| just the way things have been conducted are very
| aggraviating.
| egloeda wrote:
| It is very sad that the US Government cannot be trusted but
| this is not the first time this has happened, the German
| Chancellor's phone was tapped.
|
| On the other hand Spain started a revolutionary process of
| a constituent nature, the government of President Sanchez
| is already of a clearly totalitarian type.
|
| As a Spaniard I see a dark future.
| germandiago wrote:
| I agree with you. They say we exaggerate.
|
| No, we do not. The degradation of institutions in these
| five years is aggraviating.
| pas wrote:
| > [into] a dictatorship
|
| how? forming a coalition seems to be the opposite of
| dictatorship, no?
| germandiago wrote:
| Not sure if you are spanish. I know how my representation
| system works very well but it is not even about that. It is
| about workarounding and putting all friends in the whole
| apparatus. See one of my comments above to see how many
| people from the socialist party have been put by government
| decision to manage highest position related to propaganda,
| justice system, etc. when socialist party had hardly
| representation compared to any other government and the
| story repeats again. The amount of abuse they did is
| really, really bad IMHO.
|
| The problem is the system also, yes. But it is more than
| that only. They think institutions are their private
| property or something like no other national party so far
| IMHO.
| alfonsodev wrote:
| Is it sarcasm? you should tag it.
|
| if it's not, and you are talking about recent "amnistia"
| events, it's hilarious, because some people in Catalunya were
| prosecuted for crating a referendum, I guess for you that's
| not democratic and on the other hand exonerating those with
| charges related to it, turns the country into a dictatorship.
|
| What an irony.
|
| Btw, I'm not Catalan nor want Catalunya to part ways, far
| right wing narratives like the one you present only create
| more and more "independentistas".
| pvaldes wrote:
| > some people in Catalunya were prosecuted for crating a
| referendum, I guess for you that's not democratic
|
| The "referendum" was obviously not democratic.
|
| You seem to have doubts still about that, so let me kindly
| illustrate you, about how real democracies work.
|
| There is not a single democracy, _not a single one_ , where
| common people can replace unilaterally the powers of the
| state.
|
| Democracy does not mean that my friends and me can "vote"
| if we take your house and properties and chase you off, or
| don't do it (This is exactly what they were trying with the
| majority of the population in Catalonia).
|
| I can't create my own taxes, or decide that I am too
| beautiful to pay the taxes that I dislike.
|
| I can't replace the police and start driving like a mad in
| the highway while shooting people.
|
| I can't build my own army, or trial somebody unilaterally
| acting as prosecutor and judge.
|
| And of course I can't start an election, specially one that
| requires people to vote in a f*g cardboard urn, placed in
| the headquarters or a f*g political party.
|
| The power to start elections lies in the elected president.
| Period. The state has the monopoly of a lot of things. If
| you start elections by yourself is, first, a farce, and
| second, not democratic.
| david-gpu wrote:
| _> And of course I can 't start an election, specially
| one that requires people to vote in a f*g cardboard urn,
| placed in the headquarters or a f*g political party_
|
| You weaken your argument tremendously by using slurs like
| these.
| pvaldes wrote:
| The "democracy must allow scam referendums" fallacy has
| been discussed "ad nauseam" before. Here and on many
| other places. The term has been heavily weaponized by
| separatists and some of us are really upset to hear that
| BS again. Is like groundhog day.
|
| In any case is time to shut my mouth with apologies by
| the rambling. Lets better return to the real theme here.
| alfonsodev wrote:
| > You seem to have doubts still about that, so let me
| kindly illustrate you, about how real democracies work.
|
| oh well... thank you, but I'd rather go other places to
| illustrate myself than reading someone angry on the
| internet.
|
| > The power to start elections lies in the elected
| president. Period. The state has the monopoly of a lot of
| things. If you start elections by yourself is, first, a
| farce, and second, not democratic.
|
| I'm sure you know the difference between referendum and
| election, so I won't kindly illustrate you.
| germandiago wrote:
| I support independentist or non-independentist thinking and
| rights.
|
| What I cannot support is to violate the law in every other
| neighborhood at convenience. If we all did what Cataluna
| does in Spain (the Constitution forbids this kind of
| referendums and it was supported by 88% of the population.
|
| You cannot come and suddenly start to do these things when
| not even in Cataluna and after 40 years of institution
| colonization you do not have even 50% of support.
|
| That is just playing stupid games that can create civil
| conflicts.
|
| As I said, I am not against independence. But we have laws.
| If they say through law they cannot, maybe they are not
| doing a good enough job for their cause or people just do
| not wish it as much. That is why after doing a lot of
| things, I won't give details here but believe me, MANY,
| they did not reach even 50%.
|
| This separation according to the law should be voted by all
| spanish.
|
| Even more: if they won by 51%, independent forever? Will
| they let people do a referendum to join back to Spain?
|
| No, it makes no sense how they are doing things. They just
| do not have enough support. I am spanish, I am the son of
| people from Cataluna.
|
| Careful with what you believe from what you hear around.
|
| Inside the law, ok. Outside of the law, not ok. Otherwise
| many people will have lots of reasons to workaround laws
| they do not like, right?
|
| Promote changes in the law, ok. But not this cheating that
| will only create bigger problems, in Cataluna itself even
| more than in the rest of Spain. Half of the people or more
| are _not_ supporting this.
| Garvi wrote:
| It would seem Spain lacks the political spine to even be
| outraged. Very telling indeed, but of much deeper problems here
| in the EU.
|
| I'm positive every single individual in this thread that is
| justifying these actions, would have the opposite opinion if
| the roles were reversed. It's a shamefully ignorant position to
| have.
| ben_w wrote:
| If you let rage drive you, your enemies will notice and use
| it to manipulate you.
| kelipso wrote:
| European countries are basically just US vassals. The spies
| are there to make sure they keep following the US lead. What
| will happen if they complain? They'll get ignored and it will
| just make it more obvious how powerless they are to do
| anything about it.
| michalu wrote:
| It's mostly US spying on everyone else, especially their
| "allies" ...
| Zealotux wrote:
| To be fair, the French are spying on the US just as much
| (disclaimer: I'm French).
| TacticalCoder wrote:
| GP is right and I'm not sure how'd that work for France...
| The US had more than 50% the GDP per capita France has and
| the US has 5x the population.
|
| That's kinda the whole point: the US is still the world's
| 1st power (a place France lost after losing the Waterloo
| battle, basically) and nobody has as much spying power as
| the US do (China probably come close).
|
| A country with 1/10th the GDP of another country cannot be
| spying "just as much".
|
| P.S: and let's not forget that France is exactly nowhere
| when it comes to tech, with the biggest players like
| Dassault and Thales being irrelevant tiny players compared
| to the american behemots. In the top 100 companies by
| market cap in the world the four french ones are... Hermes,
| Dior, LVMH, etc. I don't think these exactly help spying.
|
| P.P.S: I can see I'm downvoted by french "cocorico" readers
| ; )
| hnthrowaway0315 wrote:
| And US has military bases in EU which is super convenient
| for listening stations and spy centers. Back in the Cold
| War the US held even a heavier hand in EU.
| plopilop wrote:
| I mean you seem to be simply reducing spying to the GPD,
| when it varies very much with the policies of a country.
| Israel is 27th by GDP but is a world leader in espionage,
| and especially in surveillance tools. Similarly France is
| good enough at spying that it got offered to join the 5
| eyes (it did not work out because France asked the mutual
| non-spying clause to be applied, which the US refused).
|
| So while it is probable that the US has a bigger spying
| industry, it's also hasty to dismiss another player by
| saying "lol 10% of GDP"
|
| > Hermes, Dior, LVMH, etc. I don't think these exactly
| help spying
|
| Well France carried spying activities in Syria through
| Lafarge. Sometimes all you need is a foothold into the
| good places (Syria, or, for L'Oreal, rich circles)
| dralley wrote:
| This is simply ignorant. The French were the #1 world
| leaders in industrial espionage in particular for
| decades, into the 2000s
|
| https://www.france24.com/en/20110104-france-industrial-
| espio...
|
| https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/07/02/espionage-moi/
| fullspectrumdev wrote:
| Correlating espionage to GDP/economy is probably the most
| uneducated take on the matter.
|
| Smaller countries tend to have massively outsided foreign
| espionage apparatus - see Japanese industrial espionage
| in the 1980's, the French playing silly buggers globally,
| the Chinese basically boosting their entire economy off
| the back of intelligence collection, etc.
| vbezhenar wrote:
| When was the last time US expelled Spain spy? I couldn't find
| any obvious news about it.
| appleskeptic wrote:
| They would if they could. Spain is a weak little country that
| depends on the US for defense. The US is the most powerful
| country in history. There is no symmetry.
| AlecSchueler wrote:
| So if Spain can't do it to the US that would negate the
| claim that "everyone does it to everyone else," no?
| croes wrote:
| If the US are so powerful why were their spies expelled?
|
| Seems like Spain doesn't feat any consequences.
| impossiblefork wrote:
| No, and it isn't normal at all.
|
| Notice that this has literally led to the expulsion of
| diplomats, or, I suppose, spies sent out under diplomatic
| cover.
|
| That's extremely unusual between allies. Spying on allies,
| trying to bribe or blackmail their personnel etc., is not
| normal. It makes you a security threat, and making oneself a
| security threat isn't really compatible with being allies.
|
| Presumably this is why there is now this very public declaring
| of diplomats persona non grata-- both to remove the people in
| question and to signal that what has been done isn't okay. Seen
| another way-- normally, the person who becomes persona non
| grata is a Russian.
| appleskeptic wrote:
| Wrong, allies spy on each other constantly.
| impossiblefork wrote:
| When did the US last expel a French, or Spanish or German
| diplomat? I'm pretty sure it's never happened during the
| NATO era.
|
| So either these countries don't use diplomatic cover or
| they don't spy on the US.
| roenxi wrote:
| Why would the US bother? Unless they propose not to
| engage in diplomacy, the replacement diplomat is going to
| spy on them too. It isn't like these are rogue actors,
| the spying is sponsored by their state.
|
| The only reason to even talk about it would be if they
| want to roll a particular diplomat who is hard to work
| with or if it was convenient to gin up a diplomatic
| incident so that they could pretend to be unhappy.
| impossiblefork wrote:
| The US does expel diplomats who engage in spying. For
| example, in 2022 they expelled twelve for spying in ways
| that threaten US national security.
|
| Even if you try to keep an eye they will of course try
| make keeping an eye on them difficult. The US feels it
| can spy-- with people having been found with wigs and
| whatnot, so to imagine that others can't, even if they
| are allowed to do things very freely is a little bit
| strange.
| roenxi wrote:
| When you say "in 2022" do you mean the ones listed on
| this page [0]? The "Diplomatic expulsions during the
| Russo-Ukrainian War" page? I'm sensing there might have
| been issues at play other than the espionage, which is
| routine and everyone does.
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diplomatic_expulsions_d
| uring_t...
| impossiblefork wrote:
| Notice though that the US specifically chose to give a
| reason for the explusions as espionage activities. Spain
| expelled those it expelled over 'Russia's terrible
| actions'.
|
| I think we can take the reasons for the expulsions as
| correct.
| roenxi wrote:
| The reasons are honest insofar as yes, the Russians
| expelled were involved in espionage. That part that has
| me tagging you as naive is you seem to believe that this
| was news in 2022.
|
| It is the Russian embassy. The US spooks are monitoring
| it very closely. It is not a serious position to say that
| they suddenly discovered that espionage was afoot a few
| days after the invasion. I mean, it is completely
| plausible that the invasion made them say "we're about to
| hit the Russians hard, now is the time to disrupt their
| espionage activities". But the existence of those
| espionage activities has been a given since for the
| entire history of Russian diplomatic missions in the US.
|
| The US is certainly not going to expel diplomats for
| spying under ordinary circumstances. We can see that
| because places like the Chinese, French and British and
| whatever other embassies are still allowed to exist.
| Maybe there are some African or Pacific Island embassies
| that are incompetent and just exist to chat, I dunno. But
| we know how the serious players use embassies this has
| been a thing for centuries.
| empath-nirvana wrote:
| The US doesn't expel allied diplomats, because they don't
| care if the French and Spanish and Germans are spying on
| us, _in general_. Most of the time countries get annoyed
| at allied spying, they'll make some quiet calls to their
| ally and have people quietly reassigned, rather than make
| a big deal about it. As long as the country knows who the
| allied spies are, that's good enough. What happened here
| is that the US spies were very clumsy and got caught
| committing crimes.
| halJordan wrote:
| You're asking to prove a state secret. That the spanish
| were caught expelling allied spies is almost as much a
| faux pas as it is for your spies to get caught.
|
| Also so t forget literally the entire Snowden era.
| Literally the biggest event geopolitical event between
| allies in the 2010s. I swear you guys choose to forget
| these things
| impossiblefork wrote:
| 'Caught expelling'?
|
| The US tried to infiltrate Spanish state security. That's
| a direct threat to Spanish sovereignty. Imagine if they
| had succeeded and it led to a manipulation of Spanish
| policy, against the interests of the Spanish people.
|
| It is really something incredibly bad.
| brabel wrote:
| What can Spain realistically do if the USA actually
| becomes hostile to it? The whole EU has already
| relinquished its full sovereignty a long time ago. The
| USA does as it wants and at most, the EU can expell some
| spies caught in the act as quietly as possible to not
| anger Big Uncle Sam.
| empath-nirvana wrote:
| It's 100% normal and it's an open secret that every country's
| embassy doubles as an intelligence headquarters. Every
| country spies on every other country. Allies spy on allies.
| What was unusual here is how clumsy they were and that they
| got caught doing something so dumb that Spain couldn't
| quietly sweep it under the rug.
| MichaelZuo wrote:
| I'm pretty sure the Australian and New Zealand governments
| don't try to do so against each other.
| tjpnz wrote:
| Both are members of Five Eyes and one is in bed with
| China. It would make sense for Australia to be keeping an
| eye on things.
| jl6 wrote:
| Does spying have to be "against" the target? Perhaps
| allies spy on each other to make sure they are still
| allies.
| MichaelZuo wrote:
| I highly doubt the opposite party would even want to be
| allies if their promises mean nothing and it takes the
| reports of moles to create trust in their sincerity.
|
| It seems like a self-defeating exercise.
| impossiblefork wrote:
| No, it's not at all normal-- when directed at the
| government of the target country it can be a threat to the
| sovereignty of that country.
|
| After all, the expulsions are happening for a reason. The
| Spanish clearly do not see it as you do.
|
| It might be possible for the US to avoid many consequences
| of this kind of thing due to its clout, and I can see that
| as something which would make it feel normal from a US
| point of view, but from the other side I imagine that it
| feels like someone trying to infiltrate your government to
| do things against your interests and to harm you--
| something warranting a very high level of concern,
| comparable to a planned coup.
| ImPostingOnHN wrote:
| As many are now informing you, yes, it is normal, as is
| PNG-ing spies whose diplomatic cover is blown.
|
| It's so normal that the term "diplomatic cover" exists to
| describe non-clandestine spies who are given a position
| in their country's embassy.
|
| More commonly, local intelligence agencies try to
| identify and follow the spying activity of spies with
| diplomatic cover, rather than PNG-ing them (or more
| rarely, as in this case, outing them) because that's
| easier than the unknown quantity that would replace them.
| impossiblefork wrote:
| Yes, that part is indeed very normal.
|
| But the fact that the country is a formal ally makes it,
| in my view at least, slightly different.
|
| Of course, seeing as the US is in a defence pact with
| Turkey, I can understand that being ally can't mean
| absolute non-interference, but I feel that it gets
| problematic when we're talking about actual infiltration
| of a country's security services.
|
| I think at least the Germans expected some restraint. I
| suppose if one thinks back, the Germans had a different
| view, being opposed to giving Turkey bad crypto; and I
| suppose that can be seen as them restraining their
| activities in an unreasonable way, at the same time, I
| can't accept that bribing/blackmail people on the other
| side is compatible with an alliance. Rather, with enough
| bribes/blackmail the result is a secret coup of the state
| whose personnel is being bribed or blackmailed, and I
| think if you view these things as 'normal' then you might
| even be blind to such a coup against yourself.
| threatofrain wrote:
| Normal is a descriptive word, so the way to settle this
| debate isn't to provide reasoning about why something
| _couldn 't_ be normal because it's so threatening.
| rrrrrrrrrrrryan wrote:
| Usually if/when you identify a spy from an allied
| country, you just try to keep really close tabs on them
| and otherwise let them go about their business. If they
| start crossing some boundaries, then you quietly and
| firmly let them know it's time to fuck off.
|
| You don't _publicly_ expel them unless you really want to
| weaken the alliance, and you certainly don 't _torture_
| them like some of the commenters in this thread are
| suggesting. They watch too many movies.
| cma wrote:
| Snowden leaks showed it is normal and coordinated between
| countries to bypass their citizens' procedural rights. Among
| the Five Eyes countries, they each needed warrants to spy on
| their own domestic communications, but each could spy freely
| on foreign countries. They then mutually spied on each other
| and by agreement shared the intelligence, bypassing the
| warrant process.
| karaterobot wrote:
| Spying on allies, and all that espionage entails--including
| bribery and blackmail--is done by every government in the
| world. It has always been done, and will continue to be
| forever. It is absolutely par for the course. Remember that
| ally does not mean friend, and that friend doesn't even
| really mean friend in the context of international relations
| and realpolitik.
| Paradigma11 wrote:
| It is completely normal. I once read an interview with a, I
| think french diplomat who commented on this that it is as
| important to know what your allies do and think as your
| enemies.
| unaindz wrote:
| From the article: "The case is a very serious matter, since
| recruiting secret agents of a host state to betray their
| own country is considered an openly hostile act. Such
| actions may be taken with enemy or adversary governments,
| but never with friends and allies."
| lupusreal wrote:
| Sending the spies back instead of keeping and torturing them
| generally makes the most sense because you can get more in
| return for sending them back than torturing them. If you
| torture them what do you get? Sadistic satisfaction and maybe
| some useless information about their intentions and some of
| their colleagues, etc. You also get even worse relations with
| the US government which might escalate in a generally
| destructive way. Your own spies in the US might be tortured in
| retribution, or the US might release some dirt on the Spanish
| government to punish them, might tell the world that Spain
| tortures spies to harm the global perception of Spain, etc.
|
| But if you send them back unharmed, you instead get the
| cooperation of the US government in the investigation, a public
| apology from them which is good for public sentiment, and maybe
| various other concessions behind the scenes.
| molticrystal wrote:
| What if Spain quietly disposes of them and tries to leave
| hints to anybody who comes later to investigate that Russia
| or a similar country responsible. Anybody who comes to
| replace or investigate after wards is very suspicious and
| should be monitored.
|
| For this round, you lose out on concessions, but if pulled
| off successfully you gain control over the situation, in
| addition you can get future concessions by an outing/capture
| whenever needed.
| bomewish wrote:
| Probably the Americans would find out and it's not an enemy
| you want. There would be retribution.
| fullspectrumdev wrote:
| Espionage between civilised countries has fairly civilised
| almost customary rules since the end of WW2 tbh.
|
| Spies with diplomatic cover simply get expelled/PNG'd,
| illegals get detained, put on trial and kept for potential
| horse trading, and local agents (traitors) get dealt with
| as the country sees fit. Usually by imprisonment, these
| days.
|
| The status quo of these "rules of the game" being upheld
| has been the case for _ages_ , it's in nobodies interest to
| start breaking those "rules".
| veidr wrote:
| Yes, that's correct. Everybody does it, but
| typically/historically allies, or even just non-enemies, prefer
| not to wildly escalate things.
| jerf wrote:
| Completely normal, as is catching them, expelling them, etc.
|
| What's news is that it's in the news. That's where the coded
| message is, not in the text itself.
| petesergeant wrote:
| Building up your intelligence capability in a country is much
| more easily done while they're an ally than waiting for them to
| elect an insane, unfriendly government, and doing it then
| andrelaszlo wrote:
| I thought it was interesting how close the law maps to CIA [0]:
|
| Confidentiality - disclose (procure - intent to disclose)
|
| Integrity - falsify
|
| Availability - disable
|
| > Article 584 of the Penal Code, which punishes "a Spaniard who,
| with the purpose of helping a foreign power, association or
| international organization, procures, falsifies, disables or
| discloses information classified as reserved or secret, that is
| likely to harm national security or national defense."
|
| Not super surprising maybe, information has always been
| important, but it makes me wonder what the oldest written
| equivalent of the CIA triad is.
|
| I found some references to Caesar using it [1], but no actual
| quotes.
|
| Edit: It seems like some of the downvoters think I made up some
| words that I associate with _the_ CIA (Central Intelligence
| Agency) but I 'm referring to the CIA acronym in information
| security [0]. I can understand the confusion in this context,
| sorry!
|
| 0:
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_security#Key_con...
|
| 1: https://security.stackexchange.com/a/47700
| HPsquared wrote:
| Probably something by Aristotle on what constitutes
| "trustworthiness". (Just a guess)
| user_named wrote:
| What? You just made that up. It doesn't "map" to anything
| andrelaszlo wrote:
| Haha possibly! It doesn't seem so far-fetched to me but I
| suppose we have different perspectives.
| andrelaszlo wrote:
| @lupusreal I've added a comment that might clarify what I
| meant. Thanks for explaining what didn't make sense to you,
| despite getting downvoted.
| 4gotunameagain wrote:
| "It may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be America's
| friend is fatal."
|
| -- Henry Kissinger, Nobel peace prize laureate, War criminal.
| 0xDEF wrote:
| That (taken out of context quote) was true during the Cold War
| because of the cynical realpolitik that Kissinger himself was a
| proponent of. For example he was against the US supporting
| Israel in the 1973 Yom Kippur war. That would likely have led
| to Israel being wiped out but not before launching nuclear
| missiles at Arab states and the Eastern European Soviet/Warsaw
| pact states that were supporting and arming the Arab states.
| Knowing Kissinger that was most likely his goal; lose Israel
| but turn every major industrial center in the Soviet Union and
| Warsaw pact into nuclear wasteland.
| reducesuffering wrote:
| Use the full quote, don't be misleading.
|
| "Word should be gotten to Nixon that if Thieu meets the same
| fate as Diem, the word will go out to the nations of the world
| that it may be dangerous to be America's enemy, but to be
| America's friend is fatal."
|
| It was obviously a hypothetical, "if we let this happen,
| countries will lose trust in being a friend."
| PeterStuer wrote:
| US infiltration is ubiqiotous in the EU, so there has to be more
| to this. Which lines were crossed?
| Log_out_ wrote:
| Desperate Russian divide and conquer stuff?
| greatgib wrote:
| As always, there will be a 10 minute outcry from public officials
| "so choking" and then nothing. Business as usual. No consequence
| so it can go on. According to these sources, the
| number of times in which Spain has refused to share information
| of interest to Washington is "between one and zero."
|
| That is interesting how ball sucking is this country when you
| consider that it is sure that the opposite is not true (us
| accepting to share everything that they have)
| thinkingemote wrote:
| Majority of spying by nation states is industrial or corporate,
| its not much to do with sexy international politics. It's
| uninteresting and you will not see a movie about the subject.
| It's likely they were getting details from a Spanish company,
| alternatively it may be something like details about a trade
| deal.
|
| You could probably find out which area the area chief was working
| on and look back from there.
| paulproteus wrote:
| Another possibility is that the Spanish officials were bribed to
| sell information to people pretending to be the United States,
| but not actually representing the United States.
| throwaway_skip wrote:
| This has Hunter's fingerprints all over it. I'm a fan by the way.
| solumunus wrote:
| ITT: people saying this is and isn't normal with the basis of
| their evidence being "feels". None of you apparently have any
| relevant expertise, yet have very strong opinions.
| jaimex2 wrote:
| Why werent they executed?
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