Exactly

Possibly a form of intimidation? If you were trying to keep something quite would you hire security leaks to do the work? No. this was advertising exactly what the US Government was preparing for. That heighten the mistrust already present between South Carolina and Washington DC.

However, under whose orders were these things being done? Were they Buchanan's administration, or Lincoln’s? Again was Anderson so paranoid that he was acting on his own. If Anderson was acting on his own authority, he was a dangerous loose cannon who was out of control of lawful authority. I don't believe that to be the case.

If he was not acting on his own authority then he was acting on someone’s orders to achieve an objective. The people who had passionate objectives were the Lincolnite, lead by Lincoln himself. Lincoln was the player here that had a position to protect. It was Lincoln's authority which was challenged by South Carolina threat to secede upon his election.

Buchanan was a lame duck and content to leave the matter to Lincoln. Which places Anderson squarely in the middle of a conspiracy to do one of two things. Either start a war, or force the state of South Carolina by implied threat, into renouncing their intentions to secede. In either case the outcome would be the same. Lincoln wins and his authority is preserved, no matter what the cost in human suffering.

It was South Carolina's declaration that they would secede if Lincoln was elected that drew Lincoln special attention. Fort Pickens and others such places may have been militarily important. But, It was South Carolina that was in Lincoln's crosshairs as his primary focus for punishment.

Lincoln's problem with all of this is that he couldn't be forthright about this planning or the Northern people would not have supported him as fully as they did if he looked like the aggressor in these events.