communications, such as military and political VHF radio communications.
Because short-range radio signals in other countries cannot reach the GCSB stations in New Zealand, special intercept units have to be sent close to monitor them. The GCSB has been training and directing New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) units for these special signals intelligence collection operations.
The filofax contained names and times for a series of meetings between Turner and senior intelligence staff (including from the GCSB and Direc-torate of Defence Intelligence), notes of a trip he made to Auckland-based intelligence units and, most revealing, careful lists of everything he was do-ing in his job.
According to the Director of the GCSB, Ray Parker, who is legally re-quired by the Official Information Act to make information available unless there is a stated reason for withholding it, ‘the GCSB does not receive sup-port from the New Zealand Defence Force’.1
Yet Turner’s work plan specifically referred to: a new ‘Collection Agree-ment with the GCSB’ (and ‘finding out about extant [existing] collection This filofax diary, found in a Wellington street, revealed a new, highly secret area of New Zealand overseas spying operations: covert Navy and Army intercept missions for the GCSB.
agreements’), a ‘CDF Directive for NZDF Support to the GCSB’ (CDF is the Chief of Defence Force), a ‘CDF Directive for Special Collection Opera-tions’, an ‘Annual Forecast of Special Collection Operations’ and ‘Signal[ing]
to GCSB the Training programme’.
The ‘special collection operations’ are interception missions carried out by Defence electronic warfare operators. They are trained for this work inside the GCSB and elsewhere and then use special eavesdropping equipment on missions into other countries. The GCSB decides on the collection targets and the NZDF operators bring back tapes of intercepted communications for analysis.
The filofax contained notes of Turner’s meetings with each of the Army and Navy units involved in this work. It named a number of officers who had been indoctrinated for signals intelligence duties, described new
inter-cept equipment being sought and included a note he had written to himself to get
‘GCSB feedback on the operators, tape quality etc’ of the Navy units’ work.
The government and Defence chiefs refused to comment at all about these NZDF special collection operations and the links with the GCSB revealed in the filofax. The only reaction from any Defence spokesperson was the following statement:
‘Electronic warfare is a long-established, legitimate and entirely normal part of military operations. It is not spying.’2 The first sentence is mostly true. The second is false.
Electronic warfare operators are indeed a part of modern military forces. Their job is military-oriented signals intelligence:
locating, intercepting, recording and analysing emissions from the radars, com-munications equipment and electronic weapon systems of other forces.
The operators detect radio transmissions and radar emissions, they at-tempt to work out the location and identity of the source and they collect information either from the content of communications or from the physi-cal characteristics of the emissions about the systems being used. All these functions are called electronic support measures (ESM). Their job also in-GCSB director Ray Parker: ‘The in-GCSB
does not receive support from the New Zealand Defence Force’.
Ian Jones
cludes trying to jam or confuse the other forces’ ESM and other electronic systems (these are called electronic counter-measures or ECM). Their work is often linked to targeting and defences against being targeted during military exercises and warfare.
Each Navy frigate has six to 10 electronic warfare (EW) personnel, the Army has a 21-person EW troop and the Air Force also has an EW capa-bility. Their duties include all the different aspects of elec-tronic warfare operations listed above—including collecting information from the content of intercepted communications.
In other words, spying. What Turner’s work plan revealed is that, of all these activities, the spying (‘special collection operations’) in support of the GCSB is a major part of the New Zealand Defence Force’s
electronic warfare work. The revelations contained in Turner’s filofax have been confirmed from a number of other sources.
The GCSB started training and using New Zealand Defence Force EW operators for intelligence collecting missions in 1986. In that year an Air Force squadron leader, Leon Crosse, was seconded to the GCSB’s P Sec-tion to arrange the training of Navy EW operators in preparaSec-tion for signals intelligence operations from Navy frigates. Crosse was later appointed to the GCSB’s staff in January 1988 as a one-person section for liaison with the military about these special missions. He was called W. (The filofax recorded Turner meeting with Leon Crosse at 10 am on 2 February 1994, one of his first meetings after taking up the job.)
This page from Major Turner’s filofax directly contradicted Ray Parker’s statement (opposite).
Initially, in 1986, two Navy EW operators went to the GCSB headquar-ters for several training periods, each lasting a few days. They were especially indoctrinated for signals intelligence work. Navy EW staff have been involved in these operations ever since.
The GCSB was following the example of the other UKUSA agencies, all of which use Navy ships for signals intelligence missions. A top secret 1983 memo, prepared by the Australian DSD for Foreign Minister Bill Hayden and leaked to a journalist, told of just such a mission. It described how HMAS Cessnock, with a team of DSD operators and equipment, sailed into the waters north of Australia in December 1983 to monitor the Indonesian armed forces during their operations in East Timor. The aim was to ‘provide a unique opportunity to establish the audibility in the Darwin area of Indo-nesian VHF/UHF tactical communications from Irian Jaya, the Aru Islands, Ceram and the East Lesser Sundas, including Timor, and thus their potential for exploitation for signals intelligence’. The memo went on to say that the
‘cover story’ for the operation was that the ship was ‘conducting enhanced surveillance operations in response to reports that illegal fishing has been in progress’.3 This leak gave the first posi-tive proof that Australian Navy ships were involved in DSD signals intelli-gence operations. There is also a long history of United States naval ships be-ing used in this way.
The first mission Leon Crosse co-ordinated was a trial for the EW op-erators which, like the Australian DSD operation, was aimed mainly at inves-tigating the potential for exploiting different countries’ communications for later signals intelligence missions (i.e.
seeing what was available to intercept).
Ships are used because they can patrol close enough to intercept short-range VHF and UHF radio communications.
A six-week tour of the South Pacific by the frigate HMNZS Canterbury was chosen for the trial. Between 20 June and 27 July 1986 the Canterbury visited Fiji, Tuvalu, Tonga, the Cook Islands area and Western Samoa, with the EW operators following GCSB instructions as to when and against whom they were to collect intelligence. They worked in a locked room, directly behind the bridge, on the port side of the frigate. This room contained HMNZS Canterbury: GCSB-trained and
directed Navy operators work in an off-limits room behind the bridge.
classified equipment connected to aerials above the deck. It was off-limits to other crew, earning the EW operators the nickname ‘secret squirrels’ from fellow crew members.
Crosse and the GCSB regarded the trial as a success and after their return brought the EW operators in for extra training for future missions. New Zea-land frigates had begun going on annual six-week South Pacific tours and the GCSB decided to plan a special intelligence task for each of these trips.
The Navy purchased US$12.5 million of new electronic warfare equip-ment for the four New Zealand frigates from a United States manufacturer and this was installed between 1986 and 1990. Canterbury was fitted with the new equipment in 1986, presumably before the South Pacific trip, fol-lowed by the frigates Wellington, Waikato and Southland.4
The following year’s collection mission was planned for the frigate HM-NZS Wellington, again presumably after it had had the new EW equipment installed. But as the Wellington approached its first port of call, Suva, Fiji’s 14 May 1987 military coup occurred. Faced with a serious military crisis, what was to be the second trial became the GCSB’s first real ship-based intelligence collecting operation.
The Wellington arrived at Suva two days after the coup, on 16 May, and stayed at the Walu Bay berth until ordered to leave a week later. Then, along with Australian warships, it patrolled just outside Suva beyond the territorial limit until it left the area four days later on 27 May. Being in such a position would have enabled continuous interception of short-range com-munications.
Because the Wellington was scheduled for ceremonial duties in Western Samoa and then a military exercise in the Tokelau Islands, and the Navy did not want to disturb its plans, the GCSB had to prepare hastily to con-tinue intelligence collection from a second ship, HMNZS Monowai, the Navy’s 90-metre oceanographic ship. The government had directed the Monowai to sail to Fiji in case there was a need for emergency evacuation of civilians.
The Monowai was undergoing major maintenance at the time and had to have its propellers reassembled quickly and hull work completed. It left New Zealand on 23 May and rendezvoused with the Wellington in the patrol area on the 27th. It then spent five days in Suva, until ordered to leave, and another six days after that on the patrol line.
The GCSB arranged additional intercept equipment and had crews shuf-fled around to get experienced EW operators for the Monowai. The GCSB also sent an Australian Navy signals intelligence officer on this voyage. The
Navy frigates Wellington (pictured) and Canterbury are designated as GCSB mobile stations (335 and NZC-334). Covert interception occurs while the ships are visiting ports and transiting through areas. of two Special Air Service (SAS) intelligence collec-tors who had joined the trip without government knowledge. The Austral-ian officer was a analyst from the GCSB’s K2 cell, on a two-year post-ing from the DSD to the GCSB and had previ-ously been posted to the British GCHQ. He had probably had previous experience of ship-based signals intelligence collection in his DSD work.
A confidential section of a 1986 New Zealand Defence review proposed that portable EW modules be developed for intelligence purposes for de-ployment by ship, land or air, and noted that the Royal Australian Navy ‘has such a module which has been used successfully for surveillance of Soviet naval vessels’.5 (The New Zealand Navy was still seeking such a module in 1994. Major Turner’s filofax contained notes of a meeting with the Navy in Auckland at 9 am on 2 March 1994, where he had discussed purchase of a ‘SASE—COMINT [communication intelligence] Suite’, about which
‘Commander Anson [was] unhelpful’.)6
The Monowai EW operators intercepted Fiji military radio communica-tions both from within the port and from the patrol line just south of Suva and north of Kadavu Island. At least six Australian Navy vessels were also part of the patrol at various times, including HMAS Sydney, HMAS Wool-longong, HMAS Paramatta and the same HMAS Cessnock that was used for the DSD mission in 1983. There is no doubt that at least some of them were also doing signals intelligence work.
On 7 June the Monowai left the patrol and headed to Nukualofa in Tonga, to meet a New Zealand military plane which would take some people back to New Zealand. The Monowai’s log records the ship arriving at 4 pm and
at 4.15 extra personnel—‘30 in number’—departing for the airport.7 The extra electronic warfare and GCSB staff were among them.
A second coup occurred in Fiji on 25 September 1987. The Monowai was ordered to recall its ship’s company from leave that evening and sailed from New Zealand the next day. It returned to the same patrol line off Suva and motored up and down there from 30 September until 10 October. The Monowai crew called it ‘Operation Déjà Vu’. Again the official story was that the ship was there in case the situation deteriorated and New Zealanders needed to be evacuated, but the requirement to patrol so close to Suva was clearly to allow another special collection operation.
There have been six-week naval trips to the South Pacific nearly every year since, usually by the frigates Canterbury or Wellington8 and the intercept collected has been sent from the Navy to the GCSB headquarters, where it was seen and reported on by K Unit analysis staff. Throughout this period groups of EW operators from the Canterbury and Wellington were sent for training in the now closed training unit at the Tangimoana station.
This is not an ad hoc arrangement between the Navy and the GCSB.
The areas on the frigates used for these operations are called GCSB mobile stations. The main frigates used for these operations, the Canterbury and Wellington, have been assigned UKUSA station designators—NZC-334 and NZC-335—so that the intelligence they collect can be identified wherever it ends up in the UKUSA network. The use of the ‘C’—meaning they are civilian stations—in the designators is significant. Despite the Navy staffing, they are definitely GCSB mobile stations, with all the training, tasking and analysis controlled by the GCSB.
In 1987 a collection of new aerials was installed on the roof of the operations building at Tangimoana.9 The purpose of these at first seemed inexplicable, for they are suited only to picking up short-range communica-tions from the area around the station. It is now obvious that they were put there for use in training the Navy intercept staff. The aerials, which resemble some of those you would see on a frigate, are used to listen to all the VHF radios, cellular telephones and other communications within range. This is not serious spying (and some of the local monitoring is just done for fun) but it is precisely what the operators are learning to go and do in foreign ports.
In contrast to a fixed station, on a frigate the targets change as the vessels visit different countries or pass through different areas. As a GCSB officer said, ‘Their tasks change as they change positions themselves.’ He explained how, for example, as the frigate goes up the coast of Australia the operators will be listening to Papua New Guinea; then, as it passes north of Australia,
they may be listening to East Timor. Each country the frigate visits in the South Pacific and elsewhere is also targeted (except UKUSA country ter-ritories), even while the ship is moored in the port of one of New Zealand’s friends and is being officially welcomed by the local authorities. The annual New Zealand frigate deployments to South East Asia also involve signals intelligence collection. This work is presumably directed by and passed on to the Australian DSD, since this is its area of responsibility.
The Australian Navy clearly has signals intelligence missions to South East Asian waters. One of these missions came to light in 1993 publicity sur-rounding sexual harassment of crew on the Australian frigate HMAS Swan.
The case involved women sailors who were harassed while the Swan was in South East Asia and around Hong Kong in 1992. During the inquiry it was revealed that two of the women were ‘Chinese language specialists’ and that they were working in a ‘specialised and classified area’.10 By the time of the inquiry one of these Chinese language specialists had been posted on to HMAS Harman, home of the DSD’s HF radio interception station outside Canberra.
Army EW operators were the next to be trained to support the GCSB.
Most of the New Zealand Army’s EW personnel are based with the SAS (the military’s other main covert intelligence collection unit) at the RNZAF Hobsonville base in Auckland. Although all operational Army units have an EW capability, the main EW unit is the 21-person 53 Electronic Warfare Troop at Hobsonville. This unit has a troop headquarters and four detach-ments that can be sent separately on missions.11
In the mid-1980s the Army, like the Navy, took steps to increase its EW capabilities. The Army’s Tactical Electronic Warfare Project, ‘intended to enhance the Army’s capability to gather intelligence by electronic means’12 and completed in 1990–91, included $2.75 million of new EW equipment approved by the government in January 1990.13 As with the Navy, planning for the new Army EW equipment began in 1985–86;14 and, also like the Navy EW developments, details of the Army equipment are classified.
By 1991 the GCSB was training these Army EW personnel for intercept work. In that year an issue of fortnightly Army News carried a feature about pay rates, and buried in the midst of paramedic qualifications and heavy equip-ment repair were the various types of EW skills: EW Analyst, EW Reporting, Advanced Intercept and ‘GCSB Intercept’.15 This shows that there are courses designed by the GCSB for Army EW personnel, training them to undertake special collection operations. Like the Navy operators, groups of Army EW
staff have indeed had occasional GCSB training courses at Tangimoana. The courses for Army operators began in the 1990s. No Air Force operators have received this training.
Military sources have confirmed that Army EW operations involve GCSB-directed interception projects carried out during military exercises and assistance programmes in the South Pacific and elsewhere; and possibly trips by Army EW personnel into other countries on special projects.
Major Turner had a meeting with the Army EW Troop in Auckland on 1 March 1994. The discussions included indoctrination of troop members, courses, participation of the troop in an exercise in the Cook Islands called
‘Tropic Twilight’ later that year and an ‘intercept range upgrade from 2MHz - 1 GHz’. Turner noted that only three members of the troop—a senior sergeant and two sergeants—were
currently indoctrinated.
These would have been the three operators available for Tangi-moana’s Australian sister stations). Since 1990 this co-operation has included sharing training and exer-cises. Operators from the New Zealand EW troop
attend the Australian Regular Officers Basic EW Course in Cabarlah. Also during the early 1990s, 10 operators took part in Australian EW exercises.16 In August 1992 an Army EW operator attended an EW course in Canada.17 And the filofax notes referred to an exchange of EW personnel between the New Zealand Navy and the Royal Australian Navy. In October 1993 the New Zealand troop held its own exercise, called Exercise Ultra.
The Air Force also has EW capabilities in the form of the EW maritime surveillance capabilities on its Orions and EW systems on the Skyhawks.
Military aid in Vanuatu: since about 1990 some Army units sent overseas include covert GCSB-trained interception
Military aid in Vanuatu: since about 1990 some Army units sent overseas include covert GCSB-trained interception