Despite calling attention to their GAMMA GUPY operation which eavesdropped on the mobile phone calls of Politburo leaders, it seems the National Security Agency was able to respect the rights of Jack Anderson and not engage in illegal surveillance of him at any time, even at the height of its pre-911 disregard for American rights. In contrast, the FBI and the CIA both stalked Anderson during his career, often on the flimsiest of pretexts.(1)
In response to a FOIA request I had submitted on my behalf, the NSA sent the following final response. In the letter, the NSA makes the rare concession that it indeed had records pertaining to Jack Anderson and even described them. According to the NSA, the records are “foreign intelligence reports dating from the late 1960s and early 1970s. They contain only references to news articles written by Jack Anderson: they are not “about” him, nor was he the target of any collection.”
While I'm annoyed at the NSA's FOIA office for recently demanding fees for a record cited in an NSA publication, my dealings with them leave no doubt in my mind of their forthrightness.
(1) All information not from the letter comes from Mark Feldstein's Poisoning the Press and I will add more detailed footnotes once I retrieve my copy tomorrow.
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