National Security Agency - domestic activity

The NSA's mission, as set forth in Executive Order 12333, is to collect information that constitutes "foreign intelligence or counterintelligence" while not "acquiring information concerning the domestic activities of United States persons". The NSA has declared that it relies on the FBI to collect information on foreign intelligence activities within the borders of the USA, while confining its own activities within the USA to the embassies and missions of foreign nations.

The NSA's domestic surveillance activities are limited by the requirements imposed by the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution; however, these protections do not apply to non-U.S. persons located outside of U.S. borders, so the NSA's foreign surveillance efforts are subject to far fewer limitations under U.S. law. The specific requirements for domestic surveillance operations are contained in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (FISA), which does not extend protection to non-U.S. citizens located outside of U.S. territory.

The activities described below, especially the publicly acknowledged and so-called 'Domestic Phone' tapping and Domestic Call Database programs, have prompted questions about the extent of the NSA's activities and concerns about privacy and the rule of law.

A wiretapping program named ThinThread was tested in the late 1990s, according to information obtained by the Baltimore Sun in 2006. This program may have contributed to the underlying technology used in later systems, but its safeguards on privacy were abandoned after the 9/11 attacks.

On December 16, 2005, the New York Times reported that, under White House pressure and with an executive order from President George W. Bush, the National Security Agency, in an attempt to thwart terrorism, had been conducting phone-taps on individuals in the U.S. calling persons outside the country, without obtaining warrants from a secret court as required by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

Proponents of the warrantless surveillance claim that the President has the authority to order such action, arguing that the President has powers under the Constitution that trump laws such as FISA. In addition, some argued that FISA was implicitly overridden by a subsequent statute, the Authorization for Use of Military Force, although most concede this argument is untenable after the Supreme Court's ruling in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld. The only judge to rule on the matter thus far, in the case ACLU v. NSA, concluded that such surveillance is illegal and unconstitutional; her decision is stayed pending appeal. Third party legal authorities agree that the surveillance is illegal or probably illegal, although there is more disagreement as to whether it is unconstitutional. See NSA warrantless surveillance controversy for details.

In the years after President Nixon resigned, there were several investigations of suspected misuse of CIA and NSA facilities. Senator Frank Church headed a Senate investigating committee called the Church Committee which uncovered previously unknown activity, such as a plot to assassinate Fidel Castro by the CIA, which had been ordered by President John F. Kennedy and Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy. During the investigation, it was also found that the NSA was actively tapping the phones of targeted American citizens. After the Church Committee hearings, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 became law, limiting circumstances under which domestic surveillance was allowed.

National Security Agency - non-government cryptography

NSA has been involved in debates about public policy, both as a behind-the-scenes adviser to other departments, and directly during and after Vice Admiral Bobby Ray Inman's directorship.

The NSA was embroiled in controversy concerning its involvement in the creation of the Data Encryption Standard (DES), a standard and public block cipher used by the US government. During development by IBM in the 1970s, the NSA recommended changes to the algorithm. There was suspicion the agency had deliberately weakened the algorithm sufficiently to enable it to eavesdrop if required. The suspicions were that a critical component — the so-called S-boxes — had been altered to insert a "backdoor"; and that the key length had been reduced, making it easier for the NSA to discover the key using massive computing power.

However, the public reinvention of the technique known as differential cryptanalysis suggested that one of the changes (to the S-boxes) had actually been suggested to harden the algorithm against this — then publicly unknown — method of attack; differential cryptanalysis remained publicly unknown until it was independently reinvented and published some decades later. On the other hand the shortening of the cryptographic key from 128 bits, as recommended in IBM submission, to an effective key of only 56 bits in length, has been interpreted as an intentional weakening of the algorithm by the NSA, making possible an exhaustive search for the key by those with sufficient computer power and funding.

Because of concerns that widespread use of strong cryptography would hamper government use of wiretaps, the NSA proposed the concept of key escrow in 1993 and introduced the Clipper chip that would offer stronger protection than DES but would allow access to encrypted data by authorized law enforcement officials. The proposal was strongly opposed and went nowhere.

Possibly because of previous controversy, the involvement of NSA in the selection of a successor to DES, the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES), was limited to hardware performance testing.

NSA was a major player in the debates of the 1990s regarding the export of cryptography. Cryptographic software and hardware had long been classed with fighter planes, tanks, cannons, and atomic bombs as controllable munitions. Restrictions on export were reduced but not eliminated in 1996.

The NSA/CSS has, at times, attempted to restrict the publication of academic research into cryptography; for example, the Khufu and Khafre block ciphers were voluntarily withheld in response to an NSA request to do so.

Central Intelligence Agency - controversies (part 3)

Part 1

Part 2

Declassified CIA torture manuals

In 1984, a CIA manual for training the Nicaraguan contras in psychological operations was discovered, entitled "Psychological Operations in Guerrilla War". The manual recommended “selective use of violence for propagandistic effects” and to “neutralize” (i.e., kill) government officials. Nicaraguan Contras were taught to lead:

...demonstrators into clashes with the authorities, to provoke riots or shootings, which lead to the killing of one or more persons, who will be seen as the martyrs; this situation should be taken advantage of immediately against the Government to create even bigger conflicts.

The manual also recommended:

...selective use of armed force for PSYOP [psychological operations] effect.... Carefully selected, planned targets — judges, police officials, tax collectors, etc. — may be removed for PSYOP effect in a UWOA [unconventional warfare operations area], but extensive precautions must insure that the people “concur” in such an act by thorough explanatory canvassing among the affected populace before and after conduct of the mission.

On January 24, 1997, two new manuals were declassified in response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request filed by the Baltimore Sun in 1994. The first manual, "KUBARK Counterintelligence Interrogation," dated July 1963, is the source of much of the material in the second manual. The second manual, "Human Resource Exploitation Training Manual - 1983," was used in at least seven U.S. training courses conducted in Latin American countries, including Honduras, between 1982 and 1987.

Both manuals deal exclusively with interrogation and have an entire chapter devoted to "coercive techniques." These manuals recommend arresting suspects early in the morning by surprise, blindfolding them, and stripping them naked. Interrogation rooms should be windowless, soundproof, dark and without toilets. Suspects should be held incommunicado and should be deprived of any kind of normal routine in eating and sleeping. The manuals describe coercive techniques to be used "to induce psychological regression in the subject by bringing a superior outside force to bear on his will to resist."

UFOs and Robertson Panel

In 1951 the US Air Force revitalized Project Grudge, a program investigating UFOs between 1948-1949. Captain Edward J. Ruppelt ran the program and recommended that the Battelle Memorial Institute, a Columbus, Ohio think tank, do a statistical analysis of existing UFO reports. The think tank released its report in late 1953. Before the final Battelle report was ready however, the CIA became interested in the UFO issue as a national security and arranged to have a secret official committee, the Robertson Panel, look into the compiled UFO data.

The Robertson Panel began in January 1953, and met for a total of twelve hours, studying twenty-three alleged UFO sighting cases. The CIA concluded that UFOs presented little or no interesting scientific data and were only a threat to the United States if sighting reports clogged communications facilities and created a climate of fear among the population which the enemy could exploit before launching an attack. The Robertson Panel therefore suggested, first, an active campaign of public education, perhaps using TV and radio celebrities and the services of Walt Disney Productions; second, an active debunking of sightings in order to de-mystify UFOs in the public mind. Implicit in this education campaign was increased air force secrecy about sighting reports so as not to support public interest. The committee also recommended covert surveillance of civilian UFO groups, in order to monitor those who could promote public interest in UFOs.

The recommendations of the Robertson Panel were implemented by a series of special military regulations. Joint-Army-Navy-Air Force Publication 147 (JANAP 146) of December 1953 made reprinting of any UFO sighting to the public a crime under the Espionage Act, with fines of up to ten thousand dollars and imprisonment ranging from one to ten years. This act was considered binding on all who knew of the act's existence, including commercial airline pilots. A 1954 revision of Air Force Regulation 200-2 (AFR 200-2) made all sighting reports submitted to the air force classified material and prohibited the release of any information about UFO sightings unless the sighting was able to be positively identified. In February 1958 a revision of AFR 200-2 allowed the military to give the FBI the names of people who were "illegally or deceptively bringing the subject [of UFOs] to public attention". Because of the Robertson Panel the air force's Project Blue Book's procedures of investigating UFOs also changed, attempting to find a quick explanation and then file them away. Project Blue Book was a successor of Project Grudge.

In 1956 retired marine Major Donald Keyhoe founded the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena (NICAP), a UFO investigations organization. By 1969 Keyhoe turned his focus on the CIA as the source of the UFO cover up. NICAP's board, headed by Colonel Jospeph Bryan III, forced Keyhoe to retire as NICAP chief. Bryan was actually a former covert CIA agent who had served the agency as founder and head of its psychological warfare division. Under Bryan's leadership, the NICAP disbanded its local and state affiliate groups, and by 1973 it had been completely closed.

After the Freedom of Information Act was made law in 1974, Ufologists involved in making FOIA requests reported that more than nine hundred pages of information released for the CIA indicated that the organization was collecting and analyzing sighting reports from as early as 1949. In 1997 the CIA came forward to admit its historical interest in UFOs.

Criticism for ineffectiveness

The agency has also been criticized for ineffectiveness as an intelligence gathering agency. These criticisms included allowing a double agent, Aldrich Ames, to gain high position within the organization, and for focusing on finding informants with information of dubious value rather than on processing the vast amount of open source intelligence. On October 13, 1950, the CIA had assured President Truman that the Chinese would not send troops to Korea. Six days later, over one million Chinese troops arrived. In addition, the CIA has come under particular criticism for failing to predict the collapse of the Soviet Union and India's nuclear tests or to forestall the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Proponents of the CIA respond by stating that only the failures become known to the public, whereas the successes usually cannot be known until decades have passed because release of successful operations would reveal operational methods to foreign intelligence, which could affect future and ongoing missions. Some successes for the CIA include the U-2 and SR-71 programs, and anti-Soviet operations in Afghanistan in the mid-1980s, although critics charge that these helped foster the genesis of today's terrorist groups.

Other controversies

Defectors such as former case officer Philip Agee, who later worked with the Soviet KGB and the Cuban intelligence service, have argued that CIA covert action is extraordinarily widespread, extending to propaganda campaigns within countries allied to the United States.

In a briefing held September 15, 2001, George Tenet presented the Worldwide Attack Matrix: A "top-secret" document describing covert CIA anti-terror operations in eighty countries in Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. The actions, underway or being recommended, would range from "routine propaganda to lethal covert action in preparation for military attacks." The plans, if carried out, "would give the CIA the broadest and most lethal authority in its history."

"The Family Jewels", the CAESAR-POLO-ESAU papers, and illegal activities

On 27 June 2007 the CIA released two collections of previously classified documents which outlined various activities of doubtful legality.

The first collection, the "Family Jewels," consists of almost 700 pages of responses from CIA employees to a 1973 directive from Director of Central Intelligence James Schlesinger requesting information about activities inconsistent with the Agency's charter.

The second collection, the CAESAR-POLO-ESAU papers, consists of 147 documents and 11,000 pages of research from 1953 to 1973 relating to Soviet and Chinese leadership hierarchies, and Sino-Soviet relations.

Central Intelligence Agency - controversies (part 2)

Part 1

Clandestine service

In 1996, the U.S. House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence issued a congressional report estimating that the clandestine service part of the intelligence community "easily" breaks "extremely serious laws" in countries around the world, 100,000 times every year.

According to the report, DO (Directorate of Operations) officers engage in highly illegal activities not only risk political embarrassment to his country and President, but also endanger the freedom of the clandestine officer himself. Regarded the facts and recent history, the case officers are held accountable for overseeing the Clandestine Service (CS) and the Director's of Central Intelligence (DCI) must work closely with the Director of the CS and directly responsible for him.

A pejorative term for people who work for the CIA or other intelligence agencies is often "spook." Another occasionally used phrase to refer to CIA officers, "Virginia farmboys," is incorrectly believed to be in reference to the Langley, VA headquarters. In fact, the term comes from one of the CIA's training facility for clandestine officers, Camp Peary, also known as "The Farm."

Drug trafficking

Accusations have repeatedly been made that the CIA has been involved in drug trafficking to fund illegal operations. For example, In 1996, journalist Gary Webb wrote a series of exposés for the San Jose Mercury News, entitled "Dark Alliance", in which he alleged the use of CIA aircraft, which had ferried arms to the Contras, to ship cocaine to the United States during the return flights.

Webb also alleged that Central American narcotics traffickers could import cocaine to U.S. cities in the 1980s without the interference of normal law enforcement agencies. He claimed that this led, in part, to the crack cocaine epidemic, especially in poor neighborhoods of Los Angeles, and that the CIA intervened to prevent the prosecution of drug dealers who were helping to fund the Contras. Faced with Congressional and other media criticism (especially the Los Angeles Times), the San Jose Mercury News retracted Webb's conclusions and Webb was prevented from conducting any more investigative reporting. Webb was transferred to cover non-controversial suburban stories and gave up journalism.

After the Gary Webb report in the Mercury News, the CIA Inspector General Frederick Hitz was assigned to investigate these allegations. In 1998 the new CIA director, George Tenet declared that he was releasing the report.

The report and Hitz's testimony showed that the "CIA did not 'expeditiously' cut off relations with alleged drug traffickers" and "the CIA was aware of allegations that 'dozens of people and a number of companies connected in some fashion to the contra program' were involved in drug trafficking".

Hitz also said that under an agreement in 1982 between Ronald Reagan's Attorney General William French Smith and the CIA, agency officers were not required to report allegations of drug trafficking involving non-employees, which was defined as meaning paid and non-paid "assets [meaning agents], pilots who ferried supplies to the contras, as well as contra officials and others.

This agreement, which had not previously been revealed, came at a time when there were allegations that the CIA was using drug dealers in its controversial covert operation to bring down the leftist Sandinista government in Nicaragua. Only after Congressional funds were restored in 1986 was the agreement modified to require the CIA to stop paying agents whom it believed were involved in the drug trade.

Kerry Committee report

In 1998 Representative Maxine Waters testified to Congress:

Senator Kerry and his Senate investigation found drug traffickers had used the Contra war and tie to the Contra leadership to help this deadly trade. Among their devastating findings, the Kerry committee investigators found that major drug lords used the Contra supply networks and the traffickers provided support for Contras in return. The CIA of course, created, trained, supported, and directed the Contras and were involved in every level of their war.

The Kerry Committee report found that the U.S. State Department had paid drug traffickers. Some of these payments were after the traffickers had been indicted by federal law enforcement agencies on drug charges or while traffickers were under active investigation by these same agencies. The report declared, "It is clear that individuals who provided support for the Contras were involved in drug trafficking...and elements of the Contras themselves knowingly received financial and material assistance from drug traffickers."

Drugs in Asia

It has also been alleged that the CIA was involved in the opium/heroin trade in Asia, which was the focus of Alfred W. McCoy's book, The Politics of Heroin: CIA Complicity in the Global Drug Trade, an earlier edition of which had already been subjected to an attempted CIA suppression.

The CIA's operation, Air America, has also been accused of transporting drugs.

Mafia connections and assassination plots

The United States government has conspired with organized crime figures to assassinate foreign heads of state. The CIA has been linked to several assassination attempts on foreign leaders, including first democratically elected prime minister of the Democratic Republic of Congo Patrice Lumumba, former leader of Panama Omar Torrijos and the President of Cuba, Fidel Castro. Between August 1960, and April 1961, the CIA with the help of the Mafia assassins pursued a series of plots to poison or shoot Castro according to the assassination plots proposed by Colonel Sheffield Edwards, director of the CIA's Office of Security.

Notre Dame law professor G. Robert Blakey, counsel for the House Select Committee on Assassinations, states that the CIA withheld information from the Warren Commission and frustrated the efforts of the Congressional Committee he represented.

According to a 1997 New York Times article, the CIA conducted a covert propaganda campaign to squelch criticism of the Warren Report. The CIA urged its field stations to use their "propaganda assets" to attack those who didn't agree with the Warren Report. In a dispatch from CIA headquarters, the Agency instructed its stations around the world to:

1. counteract the "new wave of books and articles criticizing the [Warren] Commission's findings...[and] conspiracy theories ...[that] have frequently thrown suspicion on our organization";
2. "discuss the publicity problem with liaison and friendly elite contacts, especially politicians and editors;" and
3. "employ propaganda assets to answer and refute the attacks of the critics. ... Book reviews and feature articles are particularly appropriate for this purpose. ... The aim of this dispatch is to provide material for countering and discrediting the claims of the conspiracy theorists..."

On January 13, 2006, the CIA launched an airstrike on Damadola, a Pakistani village near the Afghan border, where they believed Ayman al-Zawahiri was located. The airstrike killed a number of civilians but al-Zawahiri apparently was not among them. The Pakistani government issued a strong protest against the US attack, considered a violation of Pakistan's sovereignty. However, several legal experts argue that this cannot be considered an assassination attempt as al-Zawahiri is named as terrorist and an enemy combatant by the United States, and therefore this targeted killing is not covered under Executive Order 12333, which banned assassinations.

Continue reading - part 3

Central Intelligence Agency - controversies

War on terror

On November 5, 2002, newspapers reported that Al-Qaeda operatives in a car travelling through Yemen had been killed by a missile launched from a CIA-controlled Predator drone (a medium-altitude, remote-controlled aircraft). On May 15, 2005, it was reported that another of these drones had been used to assassinate Al-Qaeda figure Haitham al-Yemeni inside Pakistan.

In June 2005, two events occurred that may shape future CIA operations.

Arrest warrants for 22 CIA agents were issued within the European Union (Schengen Agreement members). The agents are alleged to have taken an Egyptian, Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr, a suspected terrorist, from Milan on 17 February 2003 for extraordinary rendition to Egypt, where according to relatives of the cleric, he was tortured. The removal of Nasr was not unusual except that the Italian government has denied having approved the rendition. Similar operations of this sort have occurred worldwide since 9/11, the vast majority with at least tacit approval by the national government. Additionally, it allegedly disrupted Italian attempts to penetrate the terrorist's Al Qaeda network. The New York Times reported soon after that it is highly unlikely that the CIA agents involved would be extradited, despite the US-Italy bilateral treaty regarding extraditions for crimes that carry a penalty of more than a year in prison.

Soon after, President Bush appointed the CIA to be in charge of all human intelligence and manned spying operations. This was the culmination of a years old turf war regarding influence, philosophy and budget between the DIA of The Pentagon and the CIA. The Pentagon, through the DIA, wanted to take control of the CIA's paramilitary operations and many of its human assets. The CIA, which has for years held that human intelligence is the core of the agency, successfully argued that the CIA's decades long experience with human resources and civilian oversight made it the ideal choice. Thus, the CIA was given charge of all US human intelligence, but as a compromise, the Pentagon was authorized to include increased paramilitary capabilities in future budget requests.

Despite reforms which have led back to what the CIA considers its traditional principal capacities, the CIA Director position has lost influence in the White House. For years, the Director of the CIA met regularly with the President to issue daily reports on ongoing operations. After the creation of the post of Director of National Intelligence, currently occupied by Mike McConnell, the report is now given by the DNI—who oversees all US Intelligence activities, including DIA operations outside of CIA jurisdiction. Former CIA Director Porter Goss, himself also a former CIA officer, denies this has had a diminishing effect on morale, in favor of promoting his singular mission to reform the CIA into the lean and agile counter-terrorism focused force he believes it should be.

On December 6, 2005, German Khalid El-Masri filed a lawsuit against former CIA Director George Tenet, claiming that he was transported from the Republic of Macedonia to a prison in Afghanistan and held captive there by the CIA for 5 months on a case of mistaken identity. Two months after his true identity had been found out, he had been taken to Albania and released without funds or an official excuse.

The 2003 War in Iraq

In December 2005, ABC News reported that former agents claimed the CIA used waterboarding, along with five other "Enhanced Interrogation Techniques", against detainees held in the secret prisons. Waterboarding is widely regarded as a form of torture, though there are reports that President Bush signed a secret "finding" that it is not, authorizing its use.

After a media and public outcry in Europe concerning headlines about "secret CIA prisons" in Poland and other US allies, the EU through its Committee on Legal Affairs investigated whether any of its members, especially Poland, the Czech Republic or Romania had any of these "secret CIA prisons." After an investigation by the EU Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights, the EU determined that it could not find any of these prisons. In fact, they could not prove if they had ever existed at all. To quote the report, "At this stage of the investigations, there is no formal, irrefutable evidence of the existence of secret CIA detention centres in Romania, Poland or any other country. Nevertheless, there are many indications from various sources which must be considered reliable, justifying the continuation of the analytical and investigative work."

On 13 December 2005 Dick Marty, investigating illegal CIA activity in Europe on behalf of the Council of Europe, reported evidence that "individuals had been abducted and transferred to other countries without respect for any legal standards". His investigation has found that no evidence exists establishing the existence of secret CIA prisons in Europe, but added that it was "highly unlikely" that European governments were unaware of the American program of renditions. However, Marty's interim report, which was based largely on a compendium of press clippings has been harshly criticised by the governments of various EU member states.

Secret CIA prisons

A story by reporter Dana Priest published in The Washington Post of November 2, 2005, reported: "The CIA has been hiding and interrogating some of its most important alleged al Qaeda captives at a Soviet-era compound in Eastern Europe, according to U.S. and foreign officials familiar with the arrangement." The reporting of the secret prisons was heavily criticized by members and former members of the Bush Administration. However, Dana Priest states no one in the administration requested that the Washington Post not print the story. Rather they asked they not publish the names of the countries in which the prisons are located. "The Post has not identified the East European countries involved in the secret program at the request of senior U.S. officials who argued that the disclosure could disrupt counter-terrorism efforts". While it was maintained that these prisons did not exist, recently the Bush administration has come forward and admitted their existence.

Khaled el-Masri – arrest warrants issued

On 31 January, 13 arrest warrants were issued for suspected CIA operatives, reportedly involved in the abduction and rendition of Khaled el-Masri, a German citizen who was abducted from Macedonia in December 2003 and eventually flown to Afghanistan. There he was held incommunicado in solitary confinement for four months and allegedly subjected to ill-treatment during interrogation. Amnesty International – which first wrote to the CIA and other U.S. authorities in August 2004 raising Khaled el-Masri’s case, but without response – welcomes this move towards holding accountable those suspected of involvement in Khaled el-Masri’s abduction and rendition. The organization calls on the US and German authorities to co-operate fully with investigations by German prosecutors into the involvement of U.S. and German officials in the rendition of Khaled el-Masri.

Abu Omar

In December, Italian prosecutors asked for the indictment of 26 US citizens, 25 of whom are suspected CIA operatives reportedly involved in the abduction and rendition of Abu Omar, a man who was abducted from Milan in 2003 and flown to Egypt, where he remains in detention. Abu Omar alleges that he has been tortured in detention in Egypt, including being hung upside down and having electric shocks applied to his testicles.

Prosecutors also asked to indict nine Italian citizens, primarily operatives of the Italian security service, SISMI. In July 2006, prosecutors also issued extradition requests for 26 US citizens; however, the Italian government has failed to forward these requests to the US authorities. While Amnesty International welcomes developments towards holding both Italian and non-Italian citizens accountable for the abduction and rendition of Abu Omar, it calls on the Italian authorities to forward the extradition requests for the 26 US citizens. The organization also calls on the US and Italian authorities to co-operate fully with investigations by Italian prosecutors into the rendition of Abu Omar.

Supporting warlords in Somalia

The US has stated that it will prevent any country from becoming a free haven for terrorists but refuses to comment on Somalia. The US supported the Ethiopian intervention to restore the UN recognized government. There have been reports of Al-Qaeda members hiding in the war-torn country. The US also carried out reconnaissance flights and air attacks targeting the 1998 Embassy terrorists.

Continue reading - part 2

Criticism and various theories - FSB (Russian Federation), Federal Security Service, Federalnaya Sluzhba Bezopasnosti.

Alleged coup organized by FSB

Starting from 1998, people from state security services came to power as Prime Ministers of Russia: a KGB veteran Yevgeny Primakov; former FSB Director Sergei Stepashin; and finally former FSB Director Vladimir Putin who was appointed in August 8, 1999.

In August 7, Shamil Basaev began incursion to Dagestan which was regarded by Anna Politkovskaya as a provocation intitiated from Moscow to start war in Chechnya, because Russian forces provided safe passage for Islamic fighters back to Chechnya. It was reported that Aleksander Voloshin from Yeltsin administration paid money to Shamil Basayev to stage this military operation (Basaev reportedly worked for Russian GRU at this time and earlier).

In September 4 a series of four Russian apartment bombings began. Three FSB agents were caught while planting a large bomb at the basement of an apartment complex in the town of Ryazan in September 22. That was last of the bombings. Russian Minister of Internal Affairs Rushailo congratulated police with preventing the terrorist act, but FSB Director Nikolai Patrushev had declared that the incident was a training exercise just an hour later, when he had learned that the FSB agents are caught.

The next day, Boris Yeltsin received a demand from 24 Russian governors to transfer all state powers to Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, according to Sergei Yushenkov Second Chechen War began on September 24. This war made Prime Minister Vladimir Putin very popular, although he was previously unknown to the public, and helped him to win a landslide victory in the presidential elections in March 26, 2000.

That was a successful coup d'état organized by the FSB to bring Vladimir Putin to power, according to former FSB officer Alexander Litvinenko, lawmaker Sergei Yushenkov, and journalist David Satter, a Johns Hopkins University and Hoover Institute scholar. All attempts to independently investigate the Russian apartment bombings were unsuccessful. Journalist Artyom Borovik died in a suspicious plane crash. Vice-chairman of Sergei Kovalev commission created to investigate the bombings Sergei Yushenkov was assassinated. Another member of this commission Yuri Shchekochikhin died presumably from poisoning by thallium. Investigator Mikhail Trepashkin hired by relatives of victims was arrested and convicted by Russian authorities for allegedly disclosing state secrets.

FSB as ruling political elite

According to former Russian Duma member Konstantin Borovoi, "Putin's appointment is the culmination of the KGB's crusade for power. This is its finale. Now the KGB runs the country." Olga Kryshtanovskaya, director of the Moscow-based Center for the Study of Elites, has found that up to 78% of 1,016 leading political figures in Russia have served previously in organizations affiliated with KGB or FSB. She said: "If in the Soviet period and the first post-Soviet period, the KGB and FSB people were mainly involved in security issues, now half are still involved in security but the other half are involved in business, political parties, NGOs, regional governments, even culture... They started to use all political institutions." "Like cockroaches spreading from a squalid apartment to the rest of the building, they have eventually gained a firm foothold everywhere," said Sergei Grigoryants, a Soviet dissident.

This situation is very similar to that of the former Soviet Union where all key positions in the government were occupied by members of the Communist Party. The KGB or FSB members usually remain in the "acting reserve" even if they formally leave the organization ("acting reserve" members receive second FSB salary, follow FSB instructions, and remain "above the law" being protected by the organization, according to Kryshtanovskaya). As Vladimir Putin said, "There is no such thing as a former KGB man". GRU defector and writer Victor Suvorov explained that members of Russian security services can leave such organizations only in a coffin, because they know too much. Soon after becoming prime minister of Russia, Putin also claimed that "A group of FSB colleagues dispatched to work undercover in the government has successfully completed its first mission.".

The idea about KGB as a leading political force rather than a security organization has been discussed by historian Abdurakhman Avtorkhanov, journalist John Barron, writer and former GRU officer Victor Suvorov, retired KGB Major General Oleg Kalugin, and Evgenia Albats. According to Avtorkhanov, "It is not true that the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party is a superpower... An absolute power thinks, acts and dictates for all of us. The name of the power — NKVD — MVD — MGB. ...Chekism in ideology, Chekism in practice. Chekism from top to bottom."

According to Albats, most KGB leaders, including Lavrenty Beria, Yuri Andropov, and Vladimir Kryuchkov, have always struggled for the power with the Communist Party and manipulated the communist leaders. Moreover, FSB has formal membership, military discipline, an extensive network of civilian informants, hardcore ideology, and support of population (60% of Russians trust FSB), which makes it a perfect totalitarian political party. However the FSB party does not advertise its leading role because the secrecy is an important advantage.

With regard to death of Aleksander Litvinenko, the highest-ranking Soviet Bloc intelligence defector, Lt. Gen. Ion Mihai Pacepa stated that there is "a band of over 6,000 former officers of the KGB — one of the most criminal organizations in history — who grabbed the most important positions in the federal and local governments, and who are perpetuating Stalin’s, Khrushchev’s, and Brezhnev’s practice of secretly assassinating people who stand in their way."

Suppression of internal dissent

Many Russian opposition lawmakers and investigative journalists have been assassinated while investigating corruption and alleged crimes conducted by FSB and state authorities: Sergei Yushenkov, ‎Yuri Shchekochikhin, Galina Starovoitova, Anna Politkovskaya, Alexander Litvinenko, Paul Klebnikov, Nadezhda Chaikova, Nina Yefimova, and many others. Former KGB officer Oleg Gordievsky believes that murders of writers Yuri Shchekochikhin (author of "Slaves of KGB"), Anna Politkovskaya, and Aleksander Litvinenko show that FSB has returned to the practice of political assassinations which were conducted in the past by Thirteenth KGB Department. Just before his death, Alexander Litvinenko accused Vladimir Putin of personally ordering the assassination of Anna Politkovskaya.

An increasing number of scientists have been accused of espionage and illegal technology exports by FSB during the last decade: researcher Igor Sutyagin, physicist Valentin Danilov, physical chemist Oleg Korobeinichev, academician Oskar Kaibyshev, and physicist Yury Ryzhov. Some other widely covered cases of political prosecution include investigator Mikhail Trepashkin and journalist Vladimir Rakhmankov. All these people are either under arrest or serve long jail sentences. Human rights groups also identified Mikhail Khodorkovsky as a political prisoner.

Ecologist and journalist Alexander Nikitin, who worked with Bellona Foundation, was accused of espionage. He published material exposing hazards posed by the Russian Navy's nuclear fleet. He was acquitted in 1999 after spending several years in prison (his case was sent for re-investigation 13 times while he remained in prison). Other cases of prosecution are the cases of investigative journalist and ecologist Grigory Pasko, Vladimir Petrenko who described danger posed by military chemical warfare stockpiles, and Nikolay Shchur, chairman of the Snezhinskiy Ecological Fund.

Other arrested people include Viktor Orekhov, a former KGB officer who assisted Soviet dissidents, Vladimir Kazantsev who disclosed illegal purchases of eavesdropping devices from foreign firms, and Vil Mirzayanov who had written that Russia was working on a nerve gas weapon.

Political dissidents from the former Soviet republics, such as Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, are often arrested by FSB and extradited to these countries for prosecution, despite to protests from international human rights organizations. Special services of Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Azerbaidjan also kidnap people at the Russian territory, with the implicit approval of FSB.

There are credible reports that FSB use drugs to erase memory of people who had access to secret information.

Criticism of anti-terrorist operations

Use of excessive force by FSB spetsnaz was criticized with regard to resolving Moscow theater hostage crisis and Beslan hostage crisis. According to Sergey Kovalev, Russian government kills its citizens without any hesitation. He provided the following examples: murdering of hostages by the poison gas during Moscow theater hostage crisis; burning school children alive by spetsnaz soldiers who used RPO flamethrowers during Beslan school hostage crisis; crimes committed by death squads in Chechnya; and assassination of Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev. Anna Politkovskaya and Irina Hakamada, who conducted unofficial negotiations with terrorists, stated that the hostage takers were not going to use their bombs to kill the people and destroy the building during Moscow theater hostage crisis.

It is also possible that FSB has returned to the old NKVD practice of creating puppet rebel forces, as during the Trust Operation, Basmachi Revolt, or operations against the Ukrainian Insurgent Army Former FSB officer Aleksander Litvinenko stated in a June 2003 interview, with the Australian SBS television programme Dateline, that two of the Chechen terrorists involved in the 2002 Moscow theatre hostage crisis — whom he named as "Abdul the Bloody" and "Abu Bakar" — were working for the FSB, and that the agency manipulated the rebels into staging the attack. Litvinenko said: "[w]hen they tried to find [Abdul the Bloody and Abu Bakar] among the dead terrorists, they weren't there. The FSB got its agents out. So the FSB agents among Chechens organised the whole thing on FSB orders, and those agents were released." The story about FSB connections with the hostage takers was confirmed by Mikhail Trepashkin. Yulia Latynina and other journalists also accused FSB of staging many smaller terrorism acts, such as market place bombing in the city of Astrakhan, bus stops bombings in the city of Voronezh, and the blowing up the Moscow-Grozny train, whereas innocent people were convicted or killed. Journalist Boris Stomakhin claimed that bombing in Moscow metro in 2004 was probably organized by FSB agents rather than by the unknown man who called to Kavkaz Center and claimed his responsibility. Stomakin was arrested and imprisoned for writing this and other articles.

Many journalists and workers of international NGOs are reported to be kidnapped by FSB-affiliated forces in Chechnya who pretended to be Chechen terrorists: Andrei Babitsky from Radio Free Europe, Arjan Erkel and Kenneth Glack from Doctors Without Borders, and others.

According to Anna Politkovskaya, most of the "Islamic terrorism cases" were fabricated by the government, and the confessions have been obtained through the torture of innocent suspects. "The plight of those sentenced for Islamic terrorism today is the same as that of the political prisoners of the Gulag Archipelago... Russia continues to be infected by Stalinism", she said.

Alleged involvement in organized crime

Former FSB officer Aleksander Litvinenko accused FSB personnel of involvement in organized crime, such as drug trafficking and contract killings. It was noted that FSB, far from being a reliable instrument in the fight against organized crime, is institutionally a part of the problem, due not only to its co-optation and penetration by criminal elements, but to its own absence of a legal bureaucratic culture and use of crime as an instrument of state policy.

International affairs

FSB collaborates very closely with secret police services from some former Soviet Republics, especially Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan The FSB is accused of working to undermine governments of Baltic states and Georgia. During 2006 Georgian-Russian espionage controversy several Russian GRU officers were accused by Georgian authorities of preparations to commit sabotage and terrorist acts. Historian J. R. Nyquist believes that "The KGB president of Russia wants to reestablish the USSR. Whether America likes it or not, this very fact leads us to a new Cold War."

Chairman of the United Nations Special Commission Richard Butler found than many Russian state-controlled companies are involved in the Oil-for-Food Programme-related fraud. As a part of this affair, former FSB Director Yevgeny Primakov had received large kickbacks from Saddam Hussein according to Butler. KGB, FSB and Russian government had very close relationships with Saddam Hussein and Iraqi Intelligence Service Mukhabarat according to Yossef Bodansky, the Director of Research of the International Strategic Studies Association.