Intercepting signals is only half of the NSA mandate, the other half is securing national communications against interception by foreign governments and organiz

Intercepting signals is only half of the NSA mandate, the other half is securing national communications against interception by foreign governments and organizations. It is possible that the NSA want other nations to have the impression that NSA audited communications protocols are insecure or may contain backdoors. They have never expressly come out to deny any of these accusations. The involvement of the NSA thus doesn't imply that they wish to weaken standards. Perhaps they want people like Schneier to question the security of these protocols and create a false aura of potential vulnerability so that their opponents don't make use of them.