The real crime in the leaked principals group discussion of the upcoming U.S. military strikes on Yemen and the Houthi was the U.S. military strikes on Yemen, strikes U.S. President Donald Trump says will continue “for a long time.” As is always the case in American strikes, though, there will be little criticism of that and no price to pay.
There are five ways, though less serious, that the leaked conversation could cause trouble for the Trump administration.
The first is that having the conversation on the open-source Signal was not only careless but possibly illegal. The New York Times says, “It is highly unusual and possibly illegal for sensitive military plans to be discussed on a messaging app, rather than by a more secure means of communication.” Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor in chief of The Atlantic, who was included in the Signal meeting, reports that “[t]he Signal app is not approved by the government for sharing classified information.” He says that, according to several national-security lawyers, “by coordinating a national-security-related action over Signal, [they] may have violated several provisions of the Espionage Act, which governs the handling of ‘national defense’ information.”
The second is that, despite defensive claims that they did not reveal any top secret or classified material, they did.
Trump defended his team, saying that the information discussed in the Signal chat was not classified. Defense secretary Pete Hegseth insisted that no war plans were discussed. But publication of Hegseth’s posts make it clear that he revealed real-time details and operational sequencing of launch times of F-18’s and drones and when strikes would start at least half an hour before U.S. warplanes launched and two hours before strikes began. He also revealed that there would be “[m]ore strikes ongoing for hours tonight.”
Releasing details of when warplanes would take off and when bombs would be dropped is not only possibly illegal, but definitely reckless. It blatantly ignored “military doctrine about operational security,” Air Force and Navy fighter pilots told the New York Times.
When targets are revealed, the enemy can relocate them. More importantly, as one former Air Force pilot told The Times, “When you disclose operational security, people can get killed.” A former Defense Department official said that revealing launch times and aircraft types “could have jeopardized pilots’ lives if it had been released or obtained.” A former Navy squadron commander explained that if “the Houthis learned the precise time of strikes and that they would be conducted by carrier-based attack planes in the northern Red Sea, they could have repositioned and prepared air defenses” that others explained are “capable of engaging fighter jets.”
The third is that Trump administration officials seem to have lied under oath. Director of national intelligence Tulsi Gabbard told a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing that “There was no classified material that was shared in that Signal group.” The director of the Central Intelligence Agency, John Ratcliffe, testified that “My communications, to be clear, in the Signal message group were entirely permissible and lawful and did not include classified information.” Though Ratcliffe may be telling the truth about his own comments, the published posts testify that those answers, made under oath, are misleading at best and dishonest at worst.
The fourth is that the posts reveal that war crimes may have been committed. In one post, national security advisor Mike Waltz updates the group that “The first target – their top missile guy – we had positive ID of him walking into his girlfriend’s building and it’s now collapsed.” The target was struck in a civilian building. Presumably, people other than the target, innocent civilians, were also in the building.
That civilian targets have been struck is not novel. Twenty-one out of thirty-eight strikes have hit civilian targets, including ports and roads that supply food and medicine, a medical center, a school, a university, Bedouin tents and residential areas have been hit. What is novel about the possible war crime revealed in the leaked posts is that it is not regarded as a regretful accident but accepted and celebrated. U.S. vice president J.D. Vance responds to the news with one word: “Excellent.” Ratcliffe calls it “A good start.” Waltz texts emojis of a fist, an American flag and fire.
And finally, the carelessness and disregard for operational security could worry American allies and create concern about sharing secret information. Ben Hodges, former commander of U.S. forces in Europe, said, the disregard for security procedure could “cause allies to be very reluctant to share analysis and intelligence” and cause them to “assume America can’t be trusted.”
Close American intelligence partners have raised questions. Richard Fadden, a former Canadian national security advisor, says “This is very worrying. Canada needs to think about what this means in practical terms: is the United States prepared to protect our secrets, as we are bound to protect theirs?” Canadian prime minister Mark Carney commented that “When mistakes happen, and sensitive intelligence leaks, lessons must be learned to prevent that from recurring…. It’s a serious, serious issue, and all lessons must be taken.” Media in other countries that share intelligence with the U.S. are asking similar questions.
Though the real crime in the conversation will go unquestioned and unpunished, the leaked top-level discussion of the principals group could lead to a number of less serious issues that could cause trouble for the Trump administration.
Ted Snider is a regular columnist on U.S. foreign policy and history at Antiwar.com and The Libertarian Institute. He is also a frequent contributor to Responsible Statecraft and The American Conservative as well as other outlets. To support his work or for media or virtual presentation requests, contact him at tedsnider@bell.net.
