WHO INVENTED IT AND WHY?
It’s pretty rare that individuals get credited with inventing giant, secret government programs. The budget and staff of the NSA are both classified, and for a long time the government refused to even admit there was such an agency. Their headquarters has its own exit off the freeway, leading directly to their enormous parking lot, which is guarded by very polite men with automatic weapons.
It’s uncommon to hear the name of a former NSA employee. It’s even more uncommon for those former employees to speak publicly about what they did for the NSA, since everything they do is classified and telling the New York Times about it could lead to charges of treason. There are a few names associated with ECHELON, but none so strongly as to be called its “inventor.”
The “why” behind ECHELON is much more obvious. At the end of the World War II, everyone thought we were going to keep the party going by kicking Stalin’s ass out of Europe and marching all the way to Moscow. All our stuff was in Europe already, and the army was eager to make a hat trick of Japan, Germany, and the Soviet Union.
Ultimately, the government decided that the world was better off if Eastern Europe wasn’t turned into any more of a scorched wasteland than it already was, but everyone still figured war was just around the corner. Work began immediately on a system to listen to the Russians. That system, combined with other signals intelligence programs, eventually became ECHELON.