C. Wiebes - Intelligence en de oorlog in Bosnië 1992-1995. De rol van de inlichtingen- en veiligheidsdiensten - Engels

204In fact the existence of Sigint satellites remained secret until 1996 until officially confirmed bythe Director of the CIA of the day, John Deutch. This confirmation was long discussed within the USgovernment. The State Department was mainly afraid of the impact this would have in certaincountries. Despite the blacked-out sections in a State Department document 1080 it is clear that the mainconcern was countries hosting US ground stations responsible for receiving and processing Comintfrom Sigint satellites. The countries in question are the United Kingdom (Menwith Hill), Germany (BadAibling), Japan (Misawa Air Base) and Australia (Pine Gap). These stations are linked to the stations ofthe UKUSA partners: Morwenstow in the United Kingdom, Leitrim in Canada, Kojerena in Australiaand Waihopai in New Zealand. 1081Nonetheless, many doubt whether there is still much point in equipping satellites for Siginttasks. The late John Millis, former Staff Director for the House Permanent Select Committee onIntelligence, believed that the possibilities provided by ground stations for Sigint were sufficient. In hisopinion the next generation of satellites no longer needed to include Sigint in their package, with thepossible exception of Elint. 1082 In addition to satellites, special manned and unmanned aircraft were alsoused to monitor the warring parties in Bosnia: RC-135 Rivet Joint Sigint aircraft from the 922 ndReconnaissance Squadron flew from RAF Mildenhall, and U-2R Senior Span reconnaissance aircraftfrom Fairford in Great Britain and in 1996 from Istres Le Tube in France. US Navy EP-3 Aries aircraft,stationed at Souda Bay Air Base on the Greek island of Crete, operated over the Adriatic Sea and wereused to monitor the military activities of the Bosnian Serbs, Muslims and Croats. The gathered Sigint(chiefly Elint) was passed on to the NATO Combined Air Operations Centre (CAOC) in Vicenza inItaly, which coordinated air operations over Bosnia. The Special Handling and Evaluation Detachment(SHED), in which the NSA participated, received this intelligence in Vicenza.1083 In Mildenhall werealso linguists, analysts and other specialists stationed the 488 th Intelligence Squadron of the US AirIntelligence Agency. 1084The first RC-135 Rivet Joint Sigint mission was flown over the Adriatic on 10 July 1992. As partof Operation Provide Promise, the UN’s humanitarian air bridge to Sarajevo, the RC-135s flew morethan 600 missions, monitoring Serb and Bosnian Serb air defence systems, military radio traffic andradar pulses. These aircraft also tracked the cargo planes that transported the aid to Sarajevo. Thesemissions were continued during Operation Deny Flight, which once again monitored the air defencesystems of the Yugoslavian Army and the Army of the Bosnian Serbs in the No Fly Zone. The RC-135s were also active in the air strikes on VRS positions during Operation Deliberate Force in 1995.The RC-135 was not the only Sigint weapon. U-2R Senior Span reconnaissance aircraft alsoregularly flew over Bosnia. The aircraft are based at Beale Air Force Base in California, but these BealeBandits later flew from Aviano Air Force Base in Italy and Istres in France. 1085 The intercepts from theseU-2s were immediately passed on by satellite to a specially created unit, known as the ConsolidatedRemote Operating Facility, Airborne (CROFA) at the headquarters of the NSA. If an intercept isimmediately passed on to a unit, this is known in the jargon as ‘real-time intelligence’. The near-real-1080 American FOIA, Letter from Daniel Krutzer, Bureau of Intelligence and Research, to Vice Admiral J. McConnell,Director NSA, 06/09/95. See: www.gwe.edu.1081 The NRO strongly advocated revealing the existence of Sigint satellites. DIRNSA, ‘Fact of Overhead SIGINTCollection’, January 4, 1996. For the release of information see State Department memorandum:http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB23/index2.html#13.1082 ‘Address at the CIRA Luncheon, 5 October 1998; John Millis’ speech, in: CIRA Newsletter, Vol. XXIII (1998/1999) 4, p.4.1083 Tim Ripley, ‘Operation Deny Flight’, World Air Power Journal, Vol. 16 (Spring 1994), pp. 19-20; Dylan Eklund, ‘TheReconnaissance Squadron’, Air World International, November 1995, p. 36 and Chris Pocock, ‘U-2: The Second Generation’,World Air Power Journal, Spring 1997, p. 94.1084 Deedee Doke, ‘US to beef up long-term air intelligence in Balkans’, European Stars & Stripes, 18/07/96.1085 Gert Kromhout, ‘Op de grens van lucht and ruimte’ (On the boundary of air and space), in: De Vliegende Hollander (1997)3/97, pp. 13-15 and ‘Overwerk voor de Dragon Lady’ (Overtime for the Dragon Lady), in: ARMEX, 81 (1997) 3, pp. 22-25.