Posted on 10/09/2007 5:58:10 AM PDT by FreedomOfExpression
A small private intelligence company that monitors Islamic terrorist groups obtained a new Osama bin Laden video ahead of its official release last month, and around 10 a.m. on Sept. 7, it notified the Bush administration of its secret acquisition. It gave two senior officials access on the condition that the officials not reveal they had it until the al-Qaeda release.
Within 20 minutes, a range of intelligence agencies had begun downloading it from the company's Web site. By midafternoon that day, the video and a transcript of its audio track had been leaked from within the Bush administration to cable television news and broadcast worldwide.
The founder of the company, the SITE Intelligence Group, says this premature disclosure tipped al-Qaeda to a security breach and destroyed a years-long surveillance operation that the company has used to intercept and pass along secret messages, videos and advance warnings of suicide bombings from the terrorist group's communications network.
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
Note the emphasis ‘from within the Bush administration’. The operatives aligned against Bush within the CIA would be a more accurate guess, IMO. Think Mary McCarthy types.
I wonder if is was the same people who leaked the fact that the BIS might have spoted Mohammed Atta and Ahmad Khalil Ibrahim Samir al-Ani meeting in Prague.
It goes without saying that whoever did this ought to be found, tried, and convicted of sedition.
Not until they start sending the leakers to prison for 20 years.
The FBI should have already been brought in to investigate.
Leakers within the government who destroy vital intelligence channels should be dealt with harshly. They are traitors and should be tried and executed.
I may be wrong, but I'm drawing a blank.
Nothing will be done. Bush has a perfect record of not prosecuting a single traitor to our country. The leaks will go on because the leakers/traitors know nothing will happen to them. They are treated as heros by the MSM and will be shielded by the democrats in congress also. Odds are it’s a Clinton hold over at the State Dept. or CIA.
“Will they ever plug up any of those leaks?”
Never. The Federal bureaucracy is overrun by leftists and they breed like the rats they are. Fire one and a dozen take his place.
Did SITE obtain the video from a private communication with someone in Al Qaeda or its media wing the Sahab institute? In this case it is a different story but I have great doubt that the SITE institute has such an access.
Note to next Republican President: Clean house after taking office !!!!
Whoever is responsible for this debacle should be on a plane to GITMO in shackles.
Not until they start taking security more seriously. I was assigned a couple of years ago at an agency that deals daily with extremely sensitive information. You can’t get into the building without a Top Secret/SCI clearance, have to swipe in and swipe out, and no cell phones or recordable media are allowed in the building. Problem was, the in/out checks of bags were cursory and nobody ever checked my pockets for a flash drive or other media storage device.
Colonel, USAFR
They had apparently hacked into the AQ intranet and were lurking.
Well, unless it turns out that they are Bush Buddies.
</DISGUST>
The founder of the company, the SITE Intelligence Group, says this premature disclosure tipped al-Qaeda to a security breach and destroyed a years-long surveillance operation that the company has used to intercept and pass along secret messages, videos and advance warnings of suicide bombings from the terrorist group's communications network.
“Not cleaning house was Jorge’s biggest mistake from day #1.”
Exactly ! So much for reaching out to the losing party in the name of bipartisanship. God Help us !!!!
So we lose an intelligence asset to gain a reporters ‘admiration’ for a scumbag ‘within the administration’?
You just shake your head.....
Yep.
This is like leaking we broke the Japanese codes in WWII, or the Germans codes.
Where’s the outrage?
I doubt it but I can be wrong.
I think they're all tied up with the Hsu Investigation. Oh, wait a minute. Never mind.
This is very vague it can be websites, forums which is not a big deal to see what is going on there or it can be private e-mails or private internet messages which someone who works for Al Qaeda or their "Sahab" media group. Again I have my doubt that SITE was able to have direct access to Al Qaeda or its Sahab.
As the article intimates, the intelligence analysts probably already had it (and probably would have sat on it until after its humiliation value had disappeared). But I bet they're enjoying watchine Al Qaeda scramble to recover.
Just DAM!
... the leaks, that is.
This is REALLY bad. It will not be that easy to repair.
Maybe they ought to make everyone and everything pass through a huge superconducting magnet that will erase ANY recordable magnetic media - except people with pacemakers, of course...
Cap’n Ed speculates that perhaps the information was intentionally leaked to disrupt AQ.
I was thinking the same thing. It's not like anyone at the CIA has any doubt as to what ABC or the NY Times will do with "secret" information. Hopefully, Al Qaeda is back to using carrier pigeons.
But why would you purposefully cause that well of information to dry up? Who knows what intel you could get from it next week, or next month?
I would guess SITE's email contained a URL which got a burst of hits after being forwarded by the White House recipients. Probably to a web site that only a few AQ insiders were supposed to know about.
Mahmoud (reviewing server logs): What is eop.gov? I see it all over!
Ahmed: Executive Office of Great Satan! Allah requires we must rehost immediately! And we must remind the brothers to be more careful.
I’m raising questions about this as well and it doesn’t pass the smell test.
Hypothetically, they could have learned that their source was about to dry up anyway, so doing communications damage was a good back-up plan. It's all speculation at this point, including the idea that this could have been a deliberate leak, or perhaps disinformation that will enhance the usability of the real intel assets.
Who knows - perhaps CIA has recruited Bin Laden's favorite goat as a humint source! ;-P
But observe how quickly the Administration was spat upon.
As if there’s only ONE “well of information”?
> Democrats are worried - they may start an investigation...
This is actually a valid thing they SHOULD investigate, but I bet they won’t because it might out someone other than “the Bush administration”.
But let me be clear— whoever is responsible— Bush administration, Dim, CIA — should be strung up by his ‘nads and shot for treason.
Bull SH!T, it was leaked from within the CIA by someone NOT appointed by this administration. How much do you want to bet?
I'm not ready to string anybody up until I've heard more...and from somewhere other than the Compost.
> As if there’s only ONE “well of information”?
One less is BAD. We need more info, a lot more. We’re in the fight of our lives, here, the very future of civilization hangs in the balance! Who triumphs: democracy or islamofascism? A poisoned well of information is a BIG DEAL, and tantamount to yanking weapons out of the hands of our soldiers. Anyone who steals weapons in a time of war is a traitor. I don’t care if it’s a Bushie, CIA, Dim, or Grampa Applecheeks from next door. Plain and simple. Don’t you agree?
Depends. And, since we don’t know the Big Picture (as if anyone truly does), I’m not going to get my undies in a bunch about it.
Rxactly. Nearly all the most damaging leaks, and ALL of the "thefts" of personal information on present and former members of the military has been perpetrated by "analysts".
Unfortunately, some posters will twist anything in order to bash Bush with it, even though it makes them look like the types who's knuckles drag on the floor. They're worse than Democrats because Democrats make no secret of being the enemy.
“The founder of the company, the SITE Intelligence Group, says this premature disclosure tipped al-Qaeda to a security breach and destroyed a years-long surveillance operation that the company has used to intercept and pass along secret messages, videos and advance warnings of suicide bombings from the terrorist group’s communications network.”
What a waste since since the video was pretty much old worthless crap.
Sounds more just like he’s looking for media attention for his company.
“I do not know of one case of someone being charged and tried for leaking secret information during the 7 yrs of this administration.”
Libby was punished for not leaking information that wasn’t secret, though.
Maybe the CIA did leak it because SITE has been ruining their work?
It gave two senior officials access on the condition that the officials not reveal they had it until the al-Qaeda release.Within 20 minutes, a range of intelligence agencies had begun downloading it from the company's Web site. By midafternoon that day, the video and a transcript of its audio track had been leaked from within the Bush administration to cable television news and broadcast worldwide.
The cable news networks will protect the secrets of the Harry Potter franchise of books but screw anything that would protect this country when a Republican is serving his elected term of office.
And it was unlikely to be "Bush" appointees as much as it is the shadow government of Clintonistas who weren't run off when the administrations changed.
Wait until the CIA shadows leak the names of the private citizens doing this research.
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