SITE, Osama bin Laden, and Online Security: What Part of "Secret" Doesn't Washington Understand?

On the morning of September 7, an Osama bin Laden video taken from Al Qaeda's online system by a private intelligence company was turned over to senior American officials. By that afternoon, the video was being broadcast on the news.

I like to be kept informed as much as anybody, but the company, SITE Intelligence Group, says that making the video public ruined years of work.

"'Techniques that took years to develop are now ineffective and worthless,' said Rita Katz, the firm's 44-year-old founder, who has garnered wide attention by publicizing statements and videos from extremist chat rooms and Web sites, while attracting controversy over the secrecy of SITE's methodology." That's how the Washington Post put it.

"While attracting controversy over the secrecy of SITE's methodology?!"

Let's think about it:

• A bunch of religious nuts have decided that they're supposed to kill Americans, wholesale.
• Being smart fanatics, they do their planning and preparation in secret
• Among other things, the fanatics set up a secure online communication system.
• A private-sector investigation firm cracks into the system, making it possible to learn of the next attack.

And there's controversy over whether or not the firm should tell how it cracked into the terrorists' system??!!

As it is, thanks to some bozo or bozos on Capitol Hill, Al Qaeda now knows that its online security has been breached, and has probably plugged the hole by now.

I sometimes wonder if the people inside the Beltway really understand what's going on. Although it isn't as obvious as the Luftwaffe's regular bombing of London, back in WWII, the war on terror is very real.

Happily, attacks like 9/11 replays of 2002 and 2003 didn't happen. Not for lack of effort, though. People like Khalid Shaikh Mohammed haven't stopped trying to promote their brand of Islam, and I don't expect them to.

I'd feel safer if the people whose job it is to run this country acted as if they realized that we're all at risk.

This Osama bin Laden video isn't the first time that that classified information has been leaked in Washington. As the St. Petersburg Times put it, writing about the fuss over the leak of September 10, 2001, messages in Arabic, "Leaking is a Washington tradition, especially on Capitol Hill. By leaking information to a reporter, members of Congress can make a point without leaving their fingerprints."

Much as I admire and respect traditions, leaking classified information while there's a war on simply doesn't make sense. The British, for example, after they cracked the Enigma code, the British had the good sense to keep the fact secret.

I'm going to make a prediction, and I hope I'm wrong.

The presidential campaign will whip our elected officials into a frenzy next year.

At least one candidate is going to demonstrate his or her knowledge of world affairs and Washington by leaking - or openly discussing - information that would have best been left under wraps until after the war.

Related posts, on Individuals and the War on Terror.

Senators, Secrets, and Sides: Loose Lips and Politics

The fuss over a New York Senator's request for details of the Pentagon's Iraq withdrawal plans is still in the news, and probably will be for quite a while. Senator Clinton even offered to have the troop deployment plans handed over in a secret meeting.

So far, the Pentagon hasn't cooperated.

Members of Congress playing politics with national security is nothing new. Unhappily, Members of Congress having trouble at keeping secrets is nothing new, too. Other people's secrets, anyway.

Back in the 80s, a senator from Vermont earned the title "Leaky" Leahy, and was forced to resign from his Intelligence Committee post: just because he released classified information during that little Achille Lauro misunderstanding.

Senator Rockefeller, of West Virginia, kept his family name in the forefront of public affairs when he announced the existence of a secret spy program, back in 2004 ("Lawmaker Says Mystery Spy Project 'Dangerous To National Security'," 12/9/04, AP, Katherine Pfleger Shrader). By implication, he was referring to national security of the USA.

What makes this quarrel interesting is a Pentagon aide who charged that the Senator's questions about Iraq withdrawal planning would help the enemy.

A spokesman for the senator said: "We sent a serious letter to the Secretary of Defense, and unacceptably got a political response back."

For once, I'm in agreement with something coming out of the New York Senator's office.

I do believe that this quarrel over letting a Senator get classified information is political, on both sides, at least in one sense of the word.

The New York Senator, in addition to a Congressional duty to examine information, has a reasonable interest in appearing active and concerned in national and international affairs. As a presidential candidate, she'd be foolish not to do what she can to 'look presidential.'

The Pentagon has a sort of political interest in plans for troop movement. This nation's military leaders, perhaps understandably, not only want to keep as many American soldiers from being killed as possible, but are required to maintain the existing power structure in the United States of America.

"Political" has been defined as being "of or relating to your views about social relationships involving authority or power." In this country, the "social relationships involving authority or power" involve a government which is run along the lines of a constitution which, among other things, guarantees the right to discuss matters involving national policy.

By this definition, the Pentagon's efforts to protect the United States of America and its government institutions is "political."

The Pentagon is clearly on the side of those who would prefer to keep the system we have, where people are allowed to disagree with those in power, and engage in debates without the approval of their leaders.

People involved in organizations like al Qaeda, the Taliban, and the Army of Islam sincerely believe that a free and open society like ours is utterly unacceptable, and must be wiped from the face of the earth.

I'm not quite sure where some of our leaders stand, judging from their track records of releasing classified information: information that would most likely hurt the United States and help those who prefer a more orderly and culturally unified society.

Geoff Metcalf's 2005 column, Congressional Intelligence Leaks, takes a rather colorful look at Capitol Hill's leaky minds.

U.S. Senator Helps Propaganda: But Not Ours

Or, With Friends Like These ...

The headline is, under the circumstances, mild: DoD rebukes Sen. Clinton on Iraq questions. The first sentence of the article is carries a rather more appropriate tone. "The Pentagon told Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton that her questions about how the U.S. plans to eventually withdraw from Iraq boosts enemy propaganda."

Undersecretary of Defense Eric Edelman was responding to New York Senator Clinton's statements in May, that the Pentagon had better hurry up and plan how to get out of Iraq.

"Premature and public discussion of the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq reinforces enemy propaganda that the United States will abandon its allies in Iraq, much as we are perceived to have done in Vietnam, Lebanon and Somalia," Edelman wrote.

Politicos broadcasting sensitive, even secret, information in wartime isn't new. At least not for the War on Terror.

Back in 2002, another Senator exercised his right to free speech, apparently without exercising his brain. Sen. Shelby the subject of probe on 9/11 intelligence leak (the Alabama Senator was a probable source of a "leak of highly classified intelligence related to al-Qaida communications in June 2002, primarily to CNN." The leak let al Qaeda know that one of their communications channels had been compromised, and that which two of their code words needed to be changed.

I suppose I shouldn't be too hard on members of the Senate. It must be difficult to keep track of what facts can be used to attract attention and get re-elected, and which, if broadcast, could kill American soldiers. Or even American Senators, if al Qaeda or a wannabe decides to take a whack at hitting the capitol again.