I'm reacting to a statement from 1994 in which it was claimed that the NSA wanted to expand its mission to ensure it could still employ the same number of people.

>I'm pretty sure they're focused on stopping terrorist attacks like 9/11 from happening.

That was not NSA's original mission and if congressional testimony is to be believed, not one NSA is particularly well suited to do. SIGINT/COMINT targeting the organs of the Soviet Union is a very different game than interrupting a terrorist plot by a small number of unknown actors.

>Note that a former NSA director (Hayden) and CIA director (Woolsey) have said they both support Apple in this case.

The FBI's position is so unreasonable that it appears nearly everyone that is well informed about the issue and isn't currently employed by the US government supports Apple, but we are talking about the Clipper Chip which was an NSA program.