Perry Fellwock (born 1947) is a former

National Security Agency The National Security Agency (NSA) is an intelligence agency of the United States Department of Defense, under the authority of the director of national intelligence (DNI). The NSA is responsible for global monitoring, collection, and proces ...

(NSA) analyst and

whistleblower Whistleblowing (also whistle-blowing or whistle blowing) is the activity of a person, often an employee, revealing information about activity within a private or public organization that is deemed illegal, immoral, illicit, unsafe, unethical or ...

who revealed the existence of the NSA and its worldwide covert surveillance network in an interview, using the pseudonym Winslow Peck, with '' Ramparts'' in 1971. At the time that Fellwock blew the whistle on

ECHELON Echelon may refer to: * A level formation ** A level or rank in an organization, profession, or society ** A military sub-subunit smaller than a company but larger than a platoon ** Echelon formation, a step-like arrangement of units * ECHELO ...

, the NSA was a nearly unknown organization and among the most secretive of the US intelligence agencies. Fellwock revealed that it had a significantly larger budget than the

Central Intelligence Agency The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA; ) is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States tasked with advancing national security through collecting and analyzing intelligence from around the world and ...

(CIA). Fellwock was motivated by

Daniel Ellsberg Daniel Ellsberg (April 7, 1931June 16, 2023) was an American political activist, economist, and United States military analyst. While employed by the RAND Corporation, he precipitated a national political controversy in 1971 when he released th ...

's release of the ''

Pentagon Papers The ''Pentagon Papers'', officially titled ''Report of the Office of the Secretary of Defense Vietnam Task Force'', is a United States Department of Defense history of the United States in the Vietnam War, United States' political and militar ...

''. Today, Fellwock has been acknowledged as the first NSA whistleblower. ECHELON is the name popularly given to the

signals intelligence Signals intelligence (SIGINT) is the act and field of intelligence-gathering by interception of ''signals'', whether communications between people (communications intelligence—abbreviated to COMINT) or from electronic signals not directly u ...

(SIGINT) collection and analysis network operated on behalf of the five signatory states (so called "

Five Eyes The Five Eyes (FVEY) is an Anglosphere intelligence alliance comprising Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States. These countries are party to the multilateral UKUSA Agreement, a treaty for joint cooperat ...

" FVEY) to the UKUSA Security Agreement. According to information in a

European Parliament The European Parliament (EP) is one of the two legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it ...

document "On the existence of a global system for the interception of private and commercial communications (ECHELON interception system)", ECHELON was ostensibly created to monitor the military and diplomatic communications of the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

and its

Eastern Bloc The Eastern Bloc, also known as the Communist Bloc (Combloc), the Socialist Bloc, the Workers Bloc, and the Soviet Bloc, was an unofficial coalition of communist states of Central and Eastern Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America that were a ...

allies during the

Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...

in the early 1960s. Because of the Fellwock revelations, the U.S. Senate United States Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities ("Church Committee" as it was chaired by

Frank Church Frank Forrester Church III (July 25, 1924 – April 7, 1984) was an American politician and lawyer. A Democrat, from 1957 to 1981 he served as a U.S. Senator from Idaho, and is currently the last Democrat to do so. He was the longest serving De ...

) introduced successful legislation in 1973 to stop the NSA from spying on American citizens. Speaking about ECHELON, Frank Church said:

"... at capability at any time could be turned around on the American people and no American would have any privacy left, such sthe capability to monitor everything: telephone conversations, telegrams, it doesn't matter. There would be no place to hide. If this government ever became a tyranny, if a dictator ever took charge in this country, the technological capacity that the intelligence community has given the government could enable it to impose total tyranny, and there would be no way to fight back, because the most careful effort to combine together in resistance to the government, no matter how privately it was done, is within the reach of the government to know. Such is the capability of this technology ... I don't want to see this country ever go across the bridge. I know the capacity that is there to make tyranny total in America, and we must see to it that this agency and all agencies that possess this technology operate within the law and under proper supervision, so that we never cross over that abyss. That is the abyss from which there is no return."

The Church Committee hearings and other congressional hearings into abuses by the

Nixon Administration Richard Nixon's tenure as the 37th president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 1969, and ended when he resigned on August 9, 1974, in the face of almost certain impeachment and removal from office, the ...

by a committee chaired by

Sam Ervin Samuel James Ervin Jr. (September 27, 1896April 23, 1985) was an American politician who served as a U.S. Senator from North Carolina from 1954 to 1974. A Southern Democrat, he liked to call himself a " country lawyer", and often told humorous ...

helped lead to the passage of the

Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (FISA, , ) is a Law of the United States, United States federal law that establishes procedures for the surveillance and collection of foreign intelligence on domestic soil.surveillance Surveillance is the monitoring of behavior, many activities, or information for the purpose of information gathering, influencing, managing, or directing. This can include observation from a distance by means of electronic equipment, such as ...

and collection of "foreign intelligence information" between "foreign powers" and "agents of foreign powers" (which may include American citizens and

permanent residents Permanent residency is a person's legal resident status in a country or territory of which such person is not a citizen but where they have the right to reside on a permanent basis. This is usually for a permanent period; a person with such l ...

suspected of espionage or terrorism) in 1978. After the

September 11 attacks The September 11 attacks, also known as 9/11, were four coordinated Islamist terrorist suicide attacks by al-Qaeda against the United States in 2001. Nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing the first two into ...

, the law was amended, enabling President

George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician and businessman who was the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Bush family and the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he i ...

to expand the warrantless surveillance of American citizens.

Early life and education

Fellwock joined the

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the Air force, air service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is one of the six United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Tracing its ori ...

in 1966. After his initial training, he was posted as an analyst to

Karamürsel Karamürsel is a municipality and Districts of Turkey, district of Kocaeli Province, Turkey. Its area is 262 km2, and its population is 59,676 (2022). It is on the south coast of the Gulf of İzmit. Before its conquest by the Ottoman Empire, ...

, near

Istanbul Istanbul is the List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, largest city in Turkey, constituting the country's economic, cultural, and historical heart. With Demographics of Istanbul, a population over , it is home to 18% of the Demographics ...

. From 1968 to 1969, he spent 13 months in Vietnam during the

Vietnam War The Vietnam War (1 November 1955 – 30 April 1975) was an armed conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia fought between North Vietnam (Democratic Republic of Vietnam) and South Vietnam (Republic of Vietnam) and their allies. North Vietnam w ...

and was stationed at

Pleiku Air Base Pleiku Air Base is a former air force base in Vietnam. It was established by the Republic of Vietnam Air Force (RVNAF) in 1962 at an undeveloped airstrip, and was used by the United States Air Force during the Vietnam War in the II Corps (Sout ...

. Upon his return from Vietnam, he transferred to the Air Force Reserves.

References

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Fellwock, Perry 1947 births Living people American whistleblowers Espionage writers American foreign policy writers American male non-fiction writers United States Air Force airmen United States Air Force reservists United States Air Force personnel of the Vietnam War National Security Agency people People from Joplin, Missouri

Early life and education

See also

References