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Stasi

  • SOURCE: Washington Post
    3/7/2023

    Cracking Stasi Puzzles is Key to Some Germans Finding the Truth

    by Katja Hoyer

    With an informant for every 90 citizens, the East German secret police left behind 16,000 sacks of shredded documents. Can information technology help reconstruct a record of what happens when a government commits to spying on its own citizens? 

  • SOURCE: The Baffler
    3/10/2022

    East Berlin Stories: Gay Espionage in Cold War Berlin

    by Samuel Huneke

    The East German Stasi recruited gay Beriners as informants both because they believed they posed a security threat and because the secret police had difficulty penetrating the secrecy of gay social networks in the city. 

  • SOURCE: The Baffler
    8/19/2021

    How Empires Fall

    by Matt Wehmeier

    "Decisive political moments are rarely expected, and even more rarely planned. Governments change all the time. But every once in a while, empires fall."

  • SOURCE: Der Spiegel
    8-14-13

    American Stasi spy tells his story

    One of East Germany's top spies was actually an American soldier. Jeff Carney defected to the Communist state in 1983 and fed the notorious Stasi with reams of valuable information. He has now written a book about his experiences.Berlin's Marienfelde district in the fall of 1983: The day Jeff Carney helped save the world was just four hours old. Carney, a 20-year-old surveillance specialist with the United States Air Force, was sitting in the early morning in front of the equipment he used to eavesdrop on the East. He was on the night shift, and there was nothing special to report.Then his supervisor told him about a secret operation that was set to take place just a few hours later. It was a war game of sorts, and it involved US fighter jets that would come within threatening range of Soviet airspace, triggering alarm signals on the Russians' radar screen and a general state of confusion. The planners expected that the other side would become so unnerved over the maneuver that emergency response procedures would be set in motion, revealing them to US reconnaissance.

  • SOURCE: Reuters
    6-11-13

    Germans accuse U.S. of Stasi tactics

    (Reuters) - German outrage over a U.S. Internet spying program has broken out ahead of a visit by Barack Obama, with ministers demanding the president provide a full explanation when he lands in Berlin next week and one official likening the tactics to those of the East German Stasi.German Chancellor Angela Merkel's spokesman has said she will raise the issue with Obama in talks next Wednesday, potentially casting a cloud over a visit that was designed to celebrate U.S.-German ties on the 50th anniversary John F. Kennedy's famous "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech.Government surveillance is an extremely sensitive topic in Germany, where memories of the dreaded Stasi secret police and its extensive network of informants are still fresh in the minds of many citizens....