
Dutch spies helped Britain's GCHQ break Argentine crypto during Falklands War - samizdis
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/05/18/maximator_euro_spy_alliance_falklands_war/
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mike_d
The Dutch have an absolutely amazing intelligence apparatus.

In 2014 AIVD hacked the office network of Russia's APT29, and maintained
access at least through the 2016 DNC hack. The best part was they also had
access to the security cameras and were able to watch the attacks in real
time.

~~~
krona
They can't be that good if you happen to know this and be writing about it on
the internet.

~~~
ArnoVW
In general, in the spyworld you do not talk about your tricks. But if you've
already been found out, and your tricks no longer work, there is still
political advantage to be had (damage your adversary, obtain credit from
partners, obtain funding, easier recrutement).

[https://arstechnica.com/information-
technology/2018/01/dutch...](https://arstechnica.com/information-
technology/2018/01/dutch-intelligence-hacked-video-cameras-in-office-of-
russians-who-hacked-dnc/)

~~~
coldtea
Or if you just want to claim it to damage your adversary, whether they have
the unit you supposedly hacked and it does what you say it does, or not...

------
fit2rule
As a citizen, I am not okay with this degree of intra-sovereign surveillance.
If I am to live in, pay taxes, and otherwise contribute to a society, I want
to be free of surveillance and subterfuge within that society - my states
laws, designed to protect me from thugs and mafia (a very real threat), should
not be thwarted by military industrial mafia hell-bent on exerting control
over sovereign states, in spite of my desires as a citizen.

The trouble is, I see no way forward for citizens of the 5-eyes states to
address this issue, other than either a) revolution to uncover and dissolve
the control networks that have been covertly put in place, or b) sedition -
leaving the state, and not contributing (taxes) to its continued economic
development.

As we have seen with Wikileaks and Julian Assange, its not enough to just
reveal the covert secrets that underpin this inner state-within-a-state -
there have to be actual repercussions for those involved, and this isn't
happening at any rate near well enough for my needs.

So, it appears that sedition is the only option - and indeed, that is what I
have done: I no longer participate in the economies of any of the 5-eyes
states, directly, and I"m about to give up my citizenship in my birth nation
over the issue.

But we know this isn't a solution. Do we have to start a brain-drain
revolution which moves the economic power of an intelligent class from state
to state? Or, do we just let mother nature do its thing, and 'hope' that
things will 'change' in the 5-eyes super-state somehow? Too many people I
trust and respect in the crypto-anarchist sphere are responding to this appeal
with "well, covid-19 will sort it out" for my liking .. but what other options
are there, really? Journalism is utterly dead and decrepit in the West, this
is not an avenue. Violent revolution makes no sense whatsoever. So, brain-
drain it is ...

~~~
MaxBarraclough
I don't follow. The article is about one state spying on the internal
communications of another state, while they were at war.

~~~
fit2rule
The subtext is one state using another states spying activities in order to
gain an advantage in its own war against a third state, and is presented in a
way that seems designed to popularise the idea of surveillance economies
exchanging with one another, without civilian oversight.

I don't think this is a good thing. We have seen that the USA has,
essentially, co=opted the intelligence-gathering communities of the peer
states in its coalition - and only seems to be 'acceptable' because its being
done by 'our side'. But I think the state issue is such a large problem that
such circumstances can only lead to further catastrophes in the future, when
these extra-sovereign entities, not bounded by any local state laws, decide
that they need to justify their continued existence by exerting that covert
power in order to create conditions conducive to the prosperity of the secret
apparatus, itself.

Are Australians okay with not being spied on by their own intelligence
agencies, while being spied on by the CIA, which then shares that information
with Australian spy agencies as an extra-sovereign economic exchange? Perhaps
they are - but I hope this is not the case elsewhere in the 5-eyes world.

What it indicates to me is that we civilians will always have to work hard to
get ahead of the military sovereign and lessen the dependencies they put in
place to continually justify their existence - i.e. we need to make peace
faster than they can make war. Would that we had another Lennon around to
assist that process...

~~~
C1sc0cat
Argentina invaded the Falklands here.

~~~
unixhero
Yes, this was no clear cut case of war. Argentina got invaded.

~~~
pjc50
Er, no - Argentina invaded first; the islands were British from colonization
onwards.

~~~
dep_b
First the Dutch, then the Spanish, who got kicked out by the British around
the Argentine independence.

Most of the time that the islands were inhabited the people that lived there
were British.

While the Spanish hold no colonies in South America anymore, the British do.

The Argentines would have been the logical successors to the Spanish and
Britain invaded Argentina as well.

It’s hard to find the good guys in this story but it would be really hard to
the people that currently live on the islands to become part of Argentina

~~~
ashtonkem
If the island were heavily populated prior to colonization, or even filled
with Argentinians, it would make sense. But it was uninhabited before
colonization, and they voted 96% in favor remaining a colony in 1986. The UK
actually attempted to transfer the island to Argentina twice in the 20th
century, but stopped because the Falkland islanders themselves _hated_ the
idea.

I think it’s pretty hard to argue that Argentina did anything but invade here,
not liberate, given the disposition of the actual people who live there.

~~~
dep_b
> But it was uninhabited before colonization

It was uninhabited before the French and Brits settled there, but soon the
French and later the Brits were replaced with Spanish settlers. It had been a
Spanish colony for decades before the British invaded and kicked the Spanish
settlers out. Of course replacing the original inhabitants with you own works,
it's the oldest trick in the book.

> the Falkland islanders themselves hated the idea.

Well apart from nationalism and resentment after the invasion joining
Argentina is also a bad move in economic terms because it has a severe crisis
every other decade.

I don't think you can ask them to join a country that does such a poor job
managing itself and Argentina should focus on economic and legal stability
before talking about it again.

It's not easy, just take a look at Hong Kong.

------
polytely
Link to the actual source:

Maximator: European signals intelligence cooperation, from a Dutch perspective

[https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02684527.2020.1...](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02684527.2020.1743538)

------
29athrowaway
Argentina did not have air refueling nor night vision equipment. They sent
conscripts to fight gurkhas. Their exocet missiles where sabotaged by the
military contractors servicing them. Their neighbors monitored them via radar
and notified movements the British.

Many countries were helping with intelligence. Norway helped by stealing
Soviet satellite imagery.

And by attacking first they could not invoke the Rio Pact.

~~~
abstractbeliefs
You're not wrong, but you're somewhat off.

Argentina did have an air to air refuelling capability, and its availability
or not was crucial in a number of instances. Likewise, the Gurkhas went out at
battalion strength near the end of the war. The exocets weren't so much
sabotaged as much as all the French simply returning home leaving the kit
unfitted and unconfigured. The stuff that had been set up already was used to
great effect.

You're right though that they did not set themselves up for success when they
did not make the most of their first mover advantage and build up the island
with supplies, equipment, and well trained soldiers rather than conscripts.

At the time, they hoped that domestic events meant that the UK simply wouldn't
care is all. They didn't come for a fight.

~~~
mytailorisrich
Indeed, I think they just assumed that the UK hadn't the strength nor the will
to start a war on the other side of the world just to fight over a barren
island.

Ironically, if they had not attacked the Falklands might be Argentinian or
under joint sovereignty now because, indeed, no-one really cared about the
Falklands. But their actions ended up guaranteeing that the UK would never
even discuss the issue for at least a century...

~~~
raphar
The argentinian public didn't care much about Malvinas before 1982 (as we call
the falklands here).

Was a desperate last move from the Military Junta to get some approval.

The Argentinian attack worked fine for M. Thatcher popularity, but not so good
for them.

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anon234345566
"a) revolution to uncover and dissolve the control networks that have been
covertly put in place, or b) sedition - leaving the state, and not
contributing (taxes) to its continued economic development."

Many have enough power to leverage a) or b), but very few choose to do so.
Why?

Because if you somehow manage to disolve the current status quo, you'd need to
rebuild a similar status quo, probably with your group deeply plugged into the
newest surveillance / society control system.

> ultimatelly you would probably have accomplished very few changes, though
> you could obtain more power / money, but

If you're capable / resourceful enough to make happen a) or b), you probably
already have lots of power / money.

Therefore, the current status quo works quite well for you, and there are
easier ways to change some things (not all of them though), than going right
to a revolution.

That's something you can see in most empires through history: very few were
intentionally brough down by internal players. Most players just wanted to get
in charge (by any means), but they were not fundamentally changing anything in
the current social order.

Going against the state was (and it is), almost certainly not the best path of
action.

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eternauta3k
Would it have been possible for Argentina to use public encryption algorithms
back then, instead of crypto machines weakened by US intelligence? No idea
what was available back in the 80s.

~~~
isbvhodnvemrwvn
Take into account that Ultra (breaking of enigma) was only made public in
1970s (or 1960s if you count information about Polish intelligence breaking
enigma before WWII). NSA only stopped using similar rotor-based designs in
1980s.

------
dvfjsdhgfv
I for one am relieved that after the Bitcoin bubble the "crypto" in headings
means cryptography again.

