There has been lot of buzz in the press in recent weeks about the NSA’s new “data center” being constructed near Bluffdale, Utah. The selection of Bluffdale, Utah for the site is curious. I suspect that this is more than a data center. Because LDS church doctrine has a strong emphasis on overseas missions, a lot of their young men come home with foreign language skills. And since many LDS church members have squeaky-clean backgrounds, they can usually get through the hurdles of a TS/SSBI clearance without much trouble. Consequently, a lot of Mormons end up with Top Secret clearances and SCI access. So it might be safe to assume that there will be some translation and analysis of SIGINT and HUMINT gathered from overseas planned for the new NSA facility.
My conjecture is based on this precedent: The 300th MI Brigade (Linguist). This Army National Guard MI organization started out as company, but grew into a battalion, and then eventually a brigade. Note that Bluffdale is not far from Orem and Draper, where the 300th MI Bde. has its HHC and two of its component ARNG MI battalions. I wouldn’t be surprised if the new facility is situated on the flats at the north end of the 24,000 acre Camp Williams Military Reservation. I guess we won’t know whether the new NSA facility is just a data center, or if it is a data center plus linguist/analyst/data fusion center until we see how big its parking lot is, and how many cars regularly park there. Furthermore, given the long-established nature of the NSA and the maturation of modern secure telecommunications domains such as NSANet and the Joint Worldwide Intelligence Communications System (JWICS), it is safe to assume that the new organization’s intel taskings could span several continents and include a variety of both civilian and military intelligence organizations (Active, Reserve, and National Guard.)
Hopefully, my conclusions will set some minds at ease. Presently, there are a lot of folks that have rushed to judgment that this new “spy center” is somehow conspiratorially directed at the American citizenry. Well, If I’m right, Utah was chosen simply because that is where the linguists with clearances are. And if they need a bunch of linguists, then their taskings are probably directed at foreign nationals, not at Mr. and Mrs. Joe Sixpack.
Who knows what goes on behind the Green Door? We’ll probably never know for certain. The preceding is just my opinion, based on open source data. I haven’t been in the loop for many years. ASA Lives!