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have password access to these files, since he was still as a trainee, he managed to acquire the necessary passwords from others working there. It could also account for why the documents he copied that pertained to NSA operations in Russia were not among those he gave to Poitras, Greenwald and other journalists. Since Russia has an active intelligence sharing treaty with China since 1996, it could further explain why his first stop was Hong Kong, a part of China. It was a safe venue for debriefing Snowden, as well as establishing his credentials among journalists as a whistle-blower, before a decision was made to allow him to proceed to Russia.
The nearly fatal problem with this early-recruitment scenario is Snowden contacts with journalists. Snowden, it will be recalled, had contacted Greenwald in December 2012. Greenwald was a high-profile blogger in Brazil who did not use encryption or any security safeguards. Next, he contacted Poitras in January 2013 in Berlin who was a magnet for NSA dissidents. Both of these contacts put Snowden’s clandestine downloading at grave risk. As known opponents of US intelligence agencies, these journalists might be, as they themselves suspected they were, under surveillance by American, British, Brazilian or German intelligence services. Greenwald and Poitras might also tell others who were either under surveillance or informers. So no matter what precaution Snowden took, his secret enterprise, or just the fact he was in contact with anti-government activists might be detected. At minimum, he could lose his access to secrets and be of no further use as a source at the NSA. He could also be interrogated and reveal the way he was brought under control. If Snowden actually had been under the control of the Russian intelligence service, the last thing it would allow was for him to take such a risk—or even to contact a single journalist. After all, the purpose of an espionage operation is to steal secrets without alerting anyone, including journalists, to the theft. A former CIA officer told me that while anything could “go haywire: in an intelligence operation, it would be “unthinkable” that the Russian intelligence service would permit a source it controlled in the NSA to expose himself by contacting journalists. It was, as he put it, a “lose-lose move.” Assuming that the operation did not “go haywire,” Snowden’s continued interactions with Poitras and Greenwald made it implausible to me that Snowden was under Russian control before he went to Hong Kong.
The Hong Kong Scenario
The second possibility is that Snowden was brought under Russian control while he was in Hong Kong. The most compelling support for this scenario comes from Putin himself, His disclosure about the case leaves little doubt that Russian officials engaged Snowden in Hong Kong, that Putin authorized his trip to Moscow while he was in Hong Kong and the Russian government allowed him to fly to Moscow without a Russian visa. We also know that Snowden indicated to Gellman he was in touch with a foreign embassy and that he met with Russian diplomats in Hong Kong. We know from US surveillance of his activities in Hong Kong that he contacted the Russian consulate. And we know that the Russians went to some lengths to facilitate his trip to Moscow. All these pieces in the Hong Kong scenario support the possibility
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