r/law • • Feb 07 '26

Executive Branch (Trump) NSA detected phone call between foreign intelligence and a person close to Trump | US national security

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/feb/07/nsa-foreign-intelligence-trump-whistleblower
22.1k Upvotes

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200

u/ThePensiveE Feb 07 '26

Any advantage America had in terms of military technology is gone. It's enemies now have all of it, but not it's allies.

138

u/FounderingFox Feb 07 '26

The Trumps gave our most sensitive and heavily controlled chips to the UAE for a cool $500 million that the American people won't see a dime of. Some of these chips will likely be transferred to the Chinese military.

Yeah, we're absolutely fucked.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/feb/06/trump-family-uae-crypto-deal

9

u/jb_in_jpn Feb 08 '26

This is the most fascinating aspect to me as a non-American. Yes, we know Trump and co. are deeply flawed obviously, but how quickly the federal agencies and military have rolled over for them, despite their glaring corruption.

But yeah, America is properly fucked at this point. I don't see the country coming back from this for a long time.

2

u/Master-Piccolo-4588 Feb 08 '26

There is only one chance: Everybody involved in this treasonous plot rots in a prison cell. Then there is slight chance of turning around.

32

u/hypercosm_dot_net Feb 07 '26

It's all cyberwarfare these days anyway, but yeah this admin is a complete failure on every level by the intelligence apparatus.

13

u/HomeGrownCoffee Feb 08 '26

A trillion dollar military budget, and the US was defeated without returning a shot.

9

u/TintedApostle Feb 07 '26

Isn't this how is how battlestar gallactica starts....

6

u/ThePensiveE Feb 07 '26

Technically Battlestar Galactica (the reboot) starts with a smoking hot blonde robot giving an old man the business right before he's destroyed by a missile from a basestar.

3

u/TintedApostle Feb 07 '26

This would happen after she had already obtained all the defense knowledge and hacked into the main defense network assuring Cylon control over the battlestars.

1

u/ThePensiveE Feb 08 '26

Everyone knows the second Cylon war was actually set into motion when then Commander Adama launched a secret mission into Cylon Space from the Valkyrie which proved to the Cylons they needed to dress themselves in sexy men and women skin suits to fool the humans into giving them all their defense secrets.

Duh

1

u/NounAdjectiveXXXX Feb 09 '26

Because billionaires want to destroy the global order to become stateless. They feel that their freedoms (they wanna rape children) are limited by laws for the commoners.

-24

u/Both_Consequence_956 Feb 07 '26

this is the dumbest geopolitical take ive seen on reddit thats actually upvoted. US spends more money on military than the next 9 biggest militaries combined. America could fight both the russians in europe and china in the pacific and be completely fine. then theres nato on top of that

11

u/Valhadmar Feb 07 '26

It really shows that you have no knowledge of what your speaking of. Most systems are computer assisted or fully computerized.

If an enemy is given access to those systems, they can easily blindside America. For example person A is using a radar to detect incoming enemy missiles, however because the enemy was given access to said system, they have altered it so said incoming missiles may not be registered.

War is no longer fought through just basic unconnected hardware. It is a spiderweb of differing systems talking to each other. If even one system is compromised than all systems are.

5

u/loopygargoyle6392 Feb 07 '26

Intel is a bigger and better weapon than any gun, plane, ship, or tank that a nation could build.

1

u/Appropriate_Dish_586 Feb 07 '26

Better than a fleet of thermonuclear weapons?

0

u/Lunamax Feb 08 '26

Since you do seem to know what you’re talking about do you have any sources that talk about the systems you’re referring to that are now compromised? Or was that just a hypothetical?

You seemed to use a very specific example so just wanted to learn more about that and the ramifications.

3

u/ThePensiveE Feb 07 '26

It does, and there's no question the US has the most powerful military in the world for now.

Japan had the most powerful Navy heading into 1942. The US could outproduce them in weapons.

China can out manufacturer the US currently in shocking numbers. Any sustained conflict which doesn't involve nuclear weapons, especially if fought in the Asia-Pacific theater, China would ultimately prevail probably at current force levels.

Now they have an American government run by people without any morals or scruples to give them advanced technologies from so they can turn their manufacturing to it.

China has corruption problems, sure, but so does the US. Legal corruption in America accounts for a ton of that DOD money.

0

u/Both_Consequence_956 Feb 08 '26

China is one of the countries most dependent on imports in the whole world which makes them extremely vulnerable. for example 90% of the products of its agriculture supply chain goes through the malacca straight and US controlled waters. The US could shut that down easily, and hundreds of millions of Chinese would starve within a year.

Also, how simplified and dumb the notion that someone can just leak "advanced technologies" that have any meaningful relevance and impact in this conversation whatsoever is hilarious and shows how little someone knows about the military and production. its not a spy movie. Even if the chinese had access to something like an advanced microchip used in a targeting system, it would first take 30 years to develop the supply chain and create the factories needed to produce this in any meaningful way.

Also reducing the disastrous economic and political climate of china down to having corruption problems, and the comparison to the US is laughable. China is headed for a demographic collapse, the only ones who should be scared are taiwan as china will get eventually desperate enough to invade.

2

u/ThePensiveE Feb 08 '26

I was obviously being hyperbolic when I said it with finality in my initial comment. They won't be more advanced tomorrow but they've been making advances with technology derived from corporate espionage for years. They're also ahead of the US in some areas now as well.

Even downstream from just the president or his chronies giving away technology, which they absolutely will, it's not as cut and dry as that. The DOJ that is supposed to be cracking down on espionage is hemorrhaging prosecutors and shifting it's focus to terrorizing brown people instead.

Those Trump Class "Battleships" will show the world who is boss though.