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. It could lead to mission failure, which itself could have catastrophic ramifications.
The fact that a disaster did not occur this time does not excuse the breach. That is why middle-level military and intelligence officers are routinely fired, and many prosecuted — although the government seems to have developed a bipartisan habit of not holding top officials accountable.
On that score, it is remarkable how administrations of both parties retreat to the same positions in such scandals, depending on which has been derelict.
The offending officials implausibly deny that they have illegally transmitted defense secrets and incoherently add that they did not, in any event, intend any harm to national security.
This was exactly the tune sung by President Obama and his top aides during Hillary Clinton’s email scandal, arising out of her use as secretary of state of a “homebrew” non-secure server system, over which passed highly sensitive government intelligence.
On the other hand, the party out of power is quick to demand that the malfeasant officials be summarily dismissed and that the Justice Department file felony charges — a posture about which they somehow develop amnesia when their side is back in charge and similarly reckless.
The Republicans who zealously rebuked Clinton are now either mum or rallying to the defense of Hegseth and the Trump administration.
In any event, the claim that “the information wasn’t classified” is a red herring. An official need not disclose documents physically marked classified in order to violate classified information laws.
Some information is communicated orally and those communications are “born classified” — i.e., they are classified from the moment they are generated — if the subject matter is secret under the guidelines, as information about imminent military operations is.
Moreover, the text of the so-called Espionage Act, under which the Justice Department frequently investigates intelligence breaches, does not refer to “classified information.” The statute, instead, criminalizes the mishandling of “information respecting the national defense.”
Most of the time, such information is classified, but it need not be to fall within the Act’s coverage — it just needs to be national defense intelligence, which information about an imminent attack surely is.
Importantly, there is no need to establish an intent to harm the United States in order to prove an Espionage Act violation.
To earn the privilege of access to defense secrets, government officials are rigorously trained in the proper handling of such information and make a solemn commitment to safeguard it.
The guidelines for doing so are demanding, often making compliance inconvenient: requiring that classified information be reviewed only in government-approved secure settings, and be communicated only through government-approved secure networks — not commercial encryption apps, such as Signal.
The upshot is that because officials commit to handle the information with care, they are liable to be cited for violating federal law if they are grossly negligent.
It is immaterial that the violation was inadvertent and that no harm to our country was meant. (There are other Espionage Act and classified information crimes that apply to attempts to undermine the US.)
I like Pete Hegseth. That said, it was reckless to disseminate information about imminent combat ops over a non-approved chat app.
As defense secretary, he is expected not just to comply with the rules but to enforce them in his department.
And it seems incredibly foolish to deny what he did, and to insult Jeffrey Goldberg, the journalist who was mistakenly included on the chat, when Hegseth knows what he said and Goldberg has the damning texts — some of which he has now published.
Trouble comes to every administration. The question is whether leaders make it better or worse.
Suffice it to say the Trump administration is not making this one better. The result is that the value of a crucial operation against the Houthis, an American enemy, is being lost.
Andrew C. McCarthy is a former federal prosecutor.