Date: June 20, 2012
Pattern Of White House Leaks Threatens Nation’s Security
From: Freedom is Knowledge
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Within the following June 2012 article from NewsMax, written by Ronald Kessler, comments have been added for your review by a former U.S. CIA official, who wishes to remain anonymous.
These comments are directed to show how serious the revelations are of damaging leaks coming from our White House, which now have compromised America's security and its relationship with our allies, not to mention former willing informants who would otherwise have helped protect America from its enemies.
It reminds us again that power corrupts, and that absolute power still corrupts . . . absolutely!
Pattern of White House Leaks Threatens Nation’s Security
Source: Newsmax
By Ronald Kessler, Thursday, June 7, 2012, 5:33 PM
Note: Bordered comments in RED are responses to this article from a former CIA official, now retired, who wishes to remain anonymous.
Ronald Kessler reporting from Washington, D.C.
An accelerating series of leaks of classified information all have two things in common: They directly endanger national security, and the stories reporting on them paint President Obama as a hero.
News reports on Tuesday disclosed that the FBI is probing the leaking of information about a classified U.S. cyberattack program aimed at Iran’s nuclear facilities, but a close look at recent developments uncovers a broad and disturbing pattern of leaks of some of the nation’s most guarded secrets by the Obama administration.
"All of these leaks were all Top Secret Codeword. That means very few people knew all the details of any of these operations. I would bet they all were managed by different groups, which is the usual procedure.
However, in ALL OF THESE REVELATIONS, sources and methods were negated. Planning these operations had to take thousands of hours. Finding locals to cooperate with us are not only hard to find but very expensive to bribe to keep the information protected.
Hundreds of contacts were probably negated in Iraq, Yemen, for the purpose just to get these operations up and running. Of course the politicians in the White House have no consideration or concern about that or the fact that once the ops are blown that procedure cannot be used again anywhere in the world!
These leaks therefore are killing our ability to penetrate our enemies, especially for ops like the Underwear Bomber. Can you imagine how many people had to be bribed, bought, and sealed (and their families) to get into Al Queda inner sanctums?"
John Brennan, Obama’s counterterrorism chief, set the tone a year ago when he went on national television immediately after the killing of Osama bin Laden and gave a highly detailed account of the top-secret operation. .
Defense Secretary Bob Gates, for one, was shocked.
Yes, because Gates knows the ramifications of such leaks which will impact operations for the next few decades. This was a massive hit to the Covert ops guys.
“Too many people in too many places are talking too much about this operation,” Gates said, adding that the level of disclosures and blabbing violates an agreement reached in the White House Situation Room on May 8, 2011, to keep details of the raid private.
“That lasted about 15 hours,” Gates said with chagrin.
When you are given a new and higher clearance, you sign an oath to keep that information secure forever! On the same sheet of paper that you sign is the result for failure to keep it classified, which is up to ten years and $10,000 fine. Since I retired it is probably more unless they're using the same form. This applied to everybody except political hacks. Then came disclosures that directly revealed secrets helpful to the enemy, that could endanger lives, and undermine trust by other countries and potential informants in U.S. intelligence operations.
Exactly! The only friends we have in the Intel world, MI-6, Mossad, and very few others, are going to be very very leery to trust us for the obvious reasons. People get killed and ops get blown when leaks get out. That is a fact in this business. Soon after the bin Laden raid, word began leaking to the press that a Pakistani doctor had helped the CIA operation.
This was a brilliant stroke of genius, now eliminated from use again in the future.
Photo Source: AP - Pakistani Physician Shakil Afridi, July 9, 2010 In fact, Dr. Shakil Afridi reportedly provided critical intelligence on the location and identify of the al-Qaida leader. He had set up a fake vaccination program to obtain DNA during a visit by bin Laden.
We should have gotten this guy out but officials probably wanted to use him more. Now that’s gone. Following the leaks, Afridi was arrested and on May 23 he was sentenced to 33 years in prison on a charge of conspiring against the state.
No other intel organization will volunteer to help us again. We have no other locals who speak Farse or any other form of Arabic that would be fluently enough to pass the test Al Queda will apply to others. So that penetration technique is now gone for good. "The blame has been placed on my brother because of America," Shakil's brother Jamil told Fox News.
The protection of secret sources of the United States is not only good sense, it is vital for continuing operations and getting new sources that could improve our security and prevent the loss of American lives. But who will trust us if we leak sensitive information?
Exactly! And critics of the Obama administration point to a pattern of leaks over a long period:
- On May 9, The Associated Press reported that a CIA asset from Saudi Arabia had infiltrated al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula and thwarted a planned “underwear bomb” attack on an airplane bound for America. As a result of that disclosure, the asset had to be extracted and brought to the United States, possibly precluding opportunities for obtaining future inside information from within the terrorist group. - On May 29, The New York Times ran a detailed account of how President Obama directs U.S. drone attacks based on a classified “kill list” of terror suspects. The story rightly credited Obama with killing top al-Qaida leaders. Sen. John McCain has charged that the kill list leak was politically motivated. - On June 1, The New York Times ran a story revealing an alleged U.S. covert action program called Olympic Games, designed to thwart Iran’s nuclear program with computer virus attacks utilizing first the Stuxnet computer worm and later the Duqu malware. Thanks to the Times article, which cited U.S. government sources, details of the previously unknown operations are now public, including how the programs were supposed to operate and the involvement of Israeli intelligence. Up to that point, the possibility that the U.S. or Israel was behind the cyberattacks on Iran’s computers was pure speculation. In effect, the Times story provided Iran with a roadmap on U.S. efforts to defeat its nuclear bomb efforts. - Another front-page New York Times article in 2011 disclosed that the Obama administration had agreed to sell to Israel bunker-buster bombs capable of destroying buried targets, including suspected nuclear weapons sites in Iran.
This was not listed in this story but should have been. When we grabbed up the information from Bin Laden’s room, there were many documents and information in there that we could not believe. We had a gang of translators in Bahgarm AFB that started to analyze the data and found a list of every manager of every Al Queda cell in the world, especially in the ME.
Rumor has it that we were going to fire up as many UAV’s as we could and kill every leader we found on the lists. That literally would have eliminated Al Queda in the next 72-96 hours. But the White House had to shoot its mouth off that we got a lot of intel from the raid, resulting in our bombing a lot of empty structures.
CNN, of course, aired the White House press release. While CNN got its minute of ratings the bad guys were gone within hours to new locations. So rather than shortening the war, a good case can be made that Obama lengthened it by his stupidity for bragging rights to the main stream media.
The Bush administration had rebuffed Israeli requests for the bombs. But word of Obama’s sale to Israel came soon after Republican Bob Turner captured the U.S. House seat vacated by the resignation of scandal-marred Anthony Weiner in a Queens, N.Y., district with a large Jewish population.
Big clue here! Former New York City Mayor Ed Koch cited Turner’s election in a Newsmax column explaining why he had decided to back Obama for re-election in 2012. He referred to a New York Times article reporting that the United States had agreed to back Israel’s call for a return to negotiations with the Palestinians without preconditions, saying the agreement was “affected” by Turner’s win, and stating that “the president should be praised” for “providing the Israeli military with bunker buster bombs” — a clear reference to the Times story about the bombs that had the effect of bucking up Jewish support for Obama.
Politics as usual, Obama obviously feeling he had to recover those bailing-out Jewish voters and Jewish cash. The leaks — which have accelerated as Obama’s re-election efforts have stumbled — have provoked bipartisan outrage.
So we have some elected people thinking, now will they do what is right and demand FBI investigation and polygraphs? The National Security council is composed of very few people, but who did they tell after they were briefed on the above projects? Start polygraphing them first, then their secretaries, their friends in the White House, and black box them all.
ALL THIS INVESTIGATION MUST BE DONE AND COMPLETED BEFORE THE ELECTION SO THE VOTERS CAN UNDERSTAND WHAT THESE PEOPLE WILL DO TO THE COUNTRY TO GET RE-ELECTED.
“In recent weeks, we have become increasingly concerned at the continued leaks regarding sensitive intelligence programs and activities including specific details of sources and methods,” said a joint statement released by the top members of the Senate Intelligence Committee and the House Select Committee on Intelligence.
Again, talk is cheap. Action is the requirement of the day. If the FBI says they can’t polygraph them, get the CIA to do it. They have better polygraphers anyway. “The accelerating pace of such disclosures, the sensitivity of the matters in question, and the harm caused to our national security interests is alarming and unacceptable,” said the statement from Sens. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga. — the chair and ranking Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee — and Reps. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., and C.A. “Dutch” Ruppersberger, D-Md. – the chair and ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee.
“These disclosures have seriously interfered with ongoing intelligence programs and have put at jeopardy our intelligence capability to act in the future. Each disclosure puts American lives at risk, makes it more difficult [if not impossible] to recruit [any new] assets, strains the trust of our partners, and threatens imminent and irreparable damage to our national security in the face of urgent and rapidly adapting threats worldwide.”
EXACTLY. In a few years the New York Times will be found blaming the CIA for future intelligence failures after their liberal actions had cut off CIA’s arms and tied their ankles together. Republican Rep. Peter King of New York, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, told the New York Post that the leaking of vital secrets reflects an “amateur hour” style of management at the White House.
Great definition of the White House's actions. “It’s a pattern that goes back two years, starting with the Times Square bomber, where somebody in the federal government, probably the FBI, leaked his name before he was captured,” he said.
I don’t know anything about that. “They mentioned we had DNA, which is how the Pakistanis focused on the doctor they arrested.
Rumor has it somebody in the White House told the mainstream media that the CIA had a doctor working for them who got the DNA. “It puts our people at risk and gives information to the enemy. And it gives our allies a reason not to work with us because what they do might show up on the front page of The New York Times.”
Today Americans live with a very dangerous progressive free press that has no regards for our country, our agents lives or the lives of recruited intel or their families lives. Today's mission is simply put, as CNN had told a military family when doing a story on their lost treasure, "If it leads, it bleeds?" And of course make some in the White House administration look clever.
Sen. John McCain of Arizona, the top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, directly accused the Obama administration of leaking sensitive intelligence information to make Obama look good.
“This is the most highly classified information and it has now been leaked by the administration at the highest levels of the White House. That’s not acceptable,” McCain said on CBS, referring to several of the recent stories.
White House Press Secretary Jay Carney rejected McCain’s claims.
“This administration takes all appropriate and necessary steps to prevent leaks of classified information or sensitive information that could risk ongoing counterterrorism or intelligence operations,” Carney told reporters.
BS. “Any suggestion that this administration has authorized intentional leaks of classified information for political gain is grossly irresponsible."
Not as irresponsible as the people who leaked the information! By inserting the phrase “for political gain,” Carney avoided denying outright that Obama had authorized the leaks. Obama could have authorized the disclosures without admitting to himself that his intent was to help him win re-election. In that case, since the president can declassify information, the disclosures would not technically be considered leaks — but they would be just as harmful.
The FBI has begun an investigation of at least two of the leaks. In addition to the probe of the cyberattacks against Iran, FBI Director Robert Mueller disclosed on May 16 that the bureau has launched an investigation into who leaked information about the al-Qaida “underwear bomber” plot to place an explosive device aboard a U.S.-bound airline flight.
Overlooked in most of the coverage is the role of the press. When Valerie Plame was exposed as a CIA operative, the press turned the disclosure into a scandal and blamed the George W. Bush administration. Plame was technically undercover but not in any danger.
Let's tell the truth for the Democrat's progressive media. Valerie talked the DCI into letting her husband go to Nigeria to “look into Yellowcake," which was stupid. Her husband was seen to some as a worthless ambassador that obviously had trouble with working with intelligence.
The whole agenda was a poorly through out effort to make President Bush look bad with his comments about Iraq and Yellowcake, which now have been proven correct. Did you know the Yellowcake was shipped to Canada for disposal? Of course, somehow the mainstream media failed to report it to John Q. Public.
Yet The New York Times ran 521 stories suggesting it was wrong for the White House, and specifically Karl Rove, to divulge her name. Only 27 of the articles mentioned the person who actually leaked her name to columnist Robert Novak, former State Department official Richard Armitage, who ironically was critical of the Bush administration.
As you know the prosecution changed horses in midstream and suddenly found someone else guilty of another “crime” in the process of this investigation, which is justification to very carefully select any “independent investigator” for such matters. In contrast, the press now is silent on leaks that genuinely impair national security and whether the Obama White House is behind the disclosures. Nor are journalists examining the legitimacy of publishing such information in the first place.
Of course this is very bad news and therefore the Democrat's mainstream media will not print it. It’s one thing to disclose classified information to expose an abuse — meaning an illegal act for political or otherwise improper purposes. It’s another to disclose secrets for the sake of revealing secrets, when agencies are doing their jobs properly and when uncovering how they perform them prevents them from carrying out secret operations in the future.
Exactly. The U.S. won World War II in part because America could intercept and decode German and Japanese military transmissions. That remained a secret until long after the war was over. Back then “loose lips sink ships” was the operative slogan.
If another major terrorist attacks occurs because foreign intelligence services and potential assets no longer want to risk cooperating with the CIA, papers like The New York Times will be the first to condemn the intelligence agencies for failing at their mission.
Already discussed above. In their joint statement, the congressional leaders said they plan to “press the executive branch to take tangible and demonstrable steps to detect and deter intelligence leaks, and to fully, fairly, and impartially investigate the disclosures that have taken place.”
We do not need the executive branch to do anything. We need the FBI to identify the leakers and publish their names, arrest and put on the stand anybody involved! In particular, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat, called for Capitol Hill hearings about the cyberattack leak.
“I am deeply disturbed by the continuing leaks of classified information to the media, most recently regarding alleged cyber efforts targeting Iran’s nuclear program,” Feinstein said.
This has cost us years of man hours by big-buck guys writing unique code bringing about lost new technologies. And it will cost us dearly in security for a growing more dangerous world. “We plan to move legislation quickly, to include possible action in this year’s intelligence authorization act,” the lawmakers said. “We believe that significant changes are needed, in legislation, in the culture of the agencies that deal with classified information, in punishing leaks, and in the level of leadership across the government to make clear that these types of disclosures will not stand.”
WE NEED THIS INVESTIGATION TO BE COMPLETED AND REPORTED TO THE VOTERS BEFORE THE NOVEMBER 2012 ELECTION. Perhaps the only way is with circumstantial evidence published on the internet, since we cannot trust the mainstream media to report it. Said Rep. Ruppersberger: “These leaks can be dangerous to our country, they can hurt us with our allies, and they could have very serious consequences. They’ve got to be stopped."
Ronald Kessler is Chief Washington Correspondent of Newsmax.com. He is the New York Times best selling author of books on the Secret Service, FBI, and CIA. Click here to read more reports from Ronald Kessler.
Article Source: © 2012 Newsmax. All rights reserved.
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