The Real Deal by Alan Smith, Stephen White, and Robin Copland - HTML preview

Whistle for It!

Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport has, for the past month, played host to a pawn in the international diplomacy game, one Edward Snowden. Mr Snowden is a “whistle-blower” who, depending on your point of view, has courageously defended the rights of downtrodden untermensch the world over, or on the other hand has committed a treasonous offense so heinous as to be punishable by a lengthy spell behind bars – a spell so long that all kinds of keys may just as well be thrown down various drains.

In short, whilst employed as an infrastructure analyst at National Security Agency contractor Booz Allen Hamilton,  he leaked  details of internet and phone surveillance by American and British Intelligence agencies. Knowing that the fan was about to become clogged, he fled the USA, initially for Hong Kong; when things became uncomfortable there, he left Hong Kong and flew to Moscow, from where he sought asylum in a number of countries. The countries willing to offer asylum were few and far between, but just as his options seemed to be running out, Vladimir Putin offered a temporary one-year asylum in Russia. There, in an unknown location, Snowden lives and presumably plots his next move.

It is well-known that Snowden is perceived by the American political elite as public enemy number one. He did the unthinkable as far as they are concerned. They want nothing more than to have him back in the USA to stand trial. It is also well-known that presidents Putin and Obama are not necessarily the best of friends, so when Snowden landed in transit on Russian soil, it must have seemed like manna from Putin’s heaven. To keep him in limbo for a month just stoked the fires; the two men talked about the situation about three weeks into the stay, but nothing came of the talks. Having wrung all that he could out of the enforced airport st