It is undeniable, or at least it should be, that “information providing advance warning that the US or its allies are preparing an attack” is to be classified as “top secret.”
It is undeniable, or at least it should be, that “information providing advance warning that the US or its allies are preparing an attack” is to be classified as “top secret.”
That is what is mandated by the government’s own Classification Guide (section 3.4.3), which is promulgated by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.
I don’t see how the Trump administration, or anyone else, could credibly contend that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s texts on an unclassified Signal communications chain did not contain such advance warnings.
Indeed, that was Hegseth’s purpose. He was alerting other top national security officials, in the two hours prior to the March 15 attacks, that the operation against the Houthis was on.
The secretary elaborated on what the sequence of strikes would be, the times, the weapons that would be used, and the targets.
This is not a matter of the righteousness of the strikes. The Houthis are Iran’s proxies. Their piracy and missile strikes have devastated shipping commerce in the Red Sea while ratcheting up Iran’s ongoing, multi-front war against Israel.
It was a worthy military operation, and Secretary Hegseth, his top-tier administration colleagues, and President Trump deserve credit for carrying it out.
They have begun to restore deterrence after four years of Biden administration passivity, which is vital for American interests.
But the blunder of discussing the details on a Signal group chat that is not authorized for the communication of national defense information — to say nothing of top secret intelligence — was an unconscionable security breach.
Under Executive Order 13256, which has controlled classification determinations for decades, information is deemed “top secret” if its “unauthorized disclosure . . . reasonably could be expected to cause exceptionally grave damage to the national security.”
Obviously, the unauthorized disclosure of an imminent combat operation could tip off the enemy and place American pilots, sailors, and soldiers in exceptionally grave danger.
