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I'm not sure precisely when we decided that intelligence gathering wasn't a part of all diplomatic relations?

I expect my government to be spying on everyone to some degree or other, friend or foe. I have to assume the same is therefore being done to us. The US simply has more money and more resources allocated to doing so.

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No, I don't expect allies to spy on each other.

That just seems so... wrong.

Why can't we just talk and discuss with each other like normal human beings? Why do we have to result to all this deceiving, tricking, spying each other?

Why can't we just act... nice?

Guess I'm just too naive for this world.

Because we're not talking about human beings. We're talking about huge, huge collectives of humans that are impossible to trust or predict. Think of states like you do of corproations: You wouldn't trust a corporation to do "the right thing" or "act nice", wouldn't you? Now image the corporation has nukes and tanks and lives next to your back door. We have a saying: "Trust is nice, surveillance is better" (which is used in different context but applies very nicely for this situation).

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