How the NSA Became a Killing Machine

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11.09.14 

In an excerpt from his new book, @War, Daily Beast reporter Shane Harris shows how the NSA went partners with the military in Iraq and changed warfare forever.

Bob Stasio never planned to become a cyber warrior. After he graduated high school, Stasio enrolled at the University at Buffalo and entered the ROTC program. He majored in mathematical physics, studying mind-bending theories of quantum mechanics and partial differential equations. The university, eager to graduate students steeped in the hard sciences, waived the major components of his core curriculum requirements, including English. Stasio never wrote a paper in his entire college career. 

Stasio arrived at Fort Lewis, Washington, in 2004, when he was 22 years old. His new brigade intelligence officer took one look at the second lieutenant’s résumé, saw the background in math and physics, and told Stasio, “You’re going to the SIGINT platoon.”