Wikileaks

I've been hearing a lot about the recent leaks of classified material to Wikileaks, and felt obliged to comment.

Since I had a Top Secret clearance for about 3 years and worked in the message center for 2nd Tank Battalion for about a year and a half where I normally picked up and processed all the confidential and secret messages for the battalion every morning, I feel like I can bring a bit of perspective to this discussion that's been missing. I spent the last 1 1/2 years in the 26th MAU headquarters, but since we worked for a full colonel, senior NCO's and officers took care of his messages; I only maintained all the classified documents and stored the encryption, COMSEC, material. At the time, these were mainly paper tapes.

First of all, you need to know how the classification system works. There are only three (3) levels of classification: Confidential, Secret, and Top Secret, with Confidential posing the least risk and Top Secret the most. Confidential material isn't normally a big deal, as much of this information is already commonly known, or will be in a short period of time. For instance, the date and time of a deployment as well as the units to be deployed is normally classified Confidential, but the same information will end up in a press release at some point and be printed in the local papers. So Confidential material is only meant to be protected for a short finite amount of time and is normally just destroyed once it's no longer needed. Other than ensuring viewers have appropriate access, there is no need to keep track of who saw it or when/how it was destroyed. Although we did keep burn reports for Confidential documents, Confidential messages didn't require any destruction reporting whatsoever -- there was just too many of them.

Secret material normally doesn't have this temporal aspect, or if it does, it's for a much longer period of time and consisted mainly of some sort of contingency plan, e.g., evacuation plans for embassies and U.S. citizens abroad are normally classified Secret. Access, storage, and disposition, i.e., destruction, was handled in much the same way as Confidential, however, destruction of Secret documents, not messages, required burn reports signed by an officer (I was authorized as the assistant Top Secret Control Officer). Secret material also required better safes and safer buildings, but nothing more -- no electric fences or security systems, etc..

Top Secret material is a completely different thing, and I only saw about a couple dozen Top Secret documents during the entire time I held my Top Secret Clearance, and this was all while serving with the 26th MAU. Also, due to the increased storage requirements, we weren't even allowed to store them ourselves when we were in garrison at Camp Lejeune and had to pick them up just before we deployed -- they were mainly of the contingency plan variety mentioned above. (please note that although I had a clearance and physical control over this material, I didn't have a "need to know" of what was in them, and other than familiarizing myself with the title and general content, so I could find the appropriate document for someone, I never read any of this stuff)

Now, the Top Secret material I had was considered "generic" Top Secret, and really wasn't that much more sensitive than the Secret material we kept. I kept it separate and locked up at all times, and other than opening the box and inventorying it every once in a while for my records, never looked at it -- and neither did anyone else during the time I held it. The reason for the difference in classification was probably due to the likelihood of an incident, e.g., if there was a contingency plan for evacuating Paris, it would probably be classified Secret and rarely if ever looked at or updated. However, I'd imaging that if we had one for Beirut, it might be considered more sensitive and be classified TS, but would still probably be of the "generic" variety and get more attention.

The interesting thing about Top Secret is that although it is the highest classification, it can also be compartmentalized, and in order to get access to it, you need to be "read into" that particular program. I was never "read into" any programs. However, since I hung out with the intel guys, I did hear enough to become familiar with the process. In any case, the access, storage, and disposition of Top Secret material is highly controlled, and while I was in, every message, photo, or document required a signature for access and had to be listed individually on a burn report when it was destroyed, with the destruction witnessed by an Officer. I'd image these requirements would be modified a bit for organizations who got a lot of Top Secret photos and messages just due to the sheer volume. Sorta like what we did for Confidential and Secret messages at our level.

I must confess that I did receive, view, and hold one Top Secret photo for over a year that was part of a program for which I was not "read into." Since I wasn't privy to this information, I didn't understand the markings, even though I'd never seen them before, and had no idea of what it was. If you do come across something like that, you are supposed to secure it, not look at it, and report it immediately.

Here's how it happened. I joined the 26th MAU SOC, which was a brand new unit, only days before our first deployment, and was the first to fill my billet. Up until that point, the job had be time shared by several individuals and the record keeping was a bit shoddy. Right before we deployed, I went down to division with a warrant officer who was the Top Secret Control officer, and he signed for all the Top Secret material and gave it to me to pack up and load on the ship.

I've got a photo somewhere of me standing on a pallet of embark boxes with a 45 along with several other guys, mostly the intel analysts all armed with M-16's, waiting to load them on a 6-by for the trip up to Moorhead City where the ships were waiting. The TS was in one of those boxes. Btw, the cool thing about transporting classified material like this is that I also had room for my bike, and other junk, in the back of the 6-by and took it on the deployment with me. (I'll have to write about that sometime too...)

Since I didn't sign for the TS material, I never really looked at it until after we got on board ship and settled in. I did an inventory and entered everything in a log, and didn't really think too much about the fact that one of the documents was a single photo. At some point, by hanging out, and drinking with them on liberty throughout the voyage, I became vaguely aware of one the compartmentalized programs they were dealing with (perhaps the only one), and during one of my inventories on my second deployment, I took a good look at the photo, the only classified photo I'd ever seen, and realized that the markings in the margin of the photo I had were in fact part of this program.

Shortly after I finished the inventory and locked everything back up, one of the analysts, a corporal from Chicago, came down to the vault to get a document. My vault was a 15-man berthing area that I shared with my alternate, a corporal in S1. It was roomier than the staterooms most of our officers had, which was a pretty sweet deal. (I'll have to write more about this later too -- this is also where I learned how to play darts)

Anyway, I told him that I thought I had something I probably shouldn't have, and showed him the photo. He immediately told me that he couldn't let me keep it and that he'd have to take it with him, so I had him sign for it and he left. Shortly thereafter, all hell broke loose. My boss, a major, came down to talk to me about it, and I gave him the specifics, showed him my records, and explained how I though the whole thing had happened. Our colonel, who was up for his first star, was not pleased.

Turns out that the warrant officer had signed for the photo separately, and by the time we got back to our office had either forgotten about it or that I wasn't part of that program, so I just packed it up with everything else and we both forgot about it. He should have kept it and given it to his group; He was part of S2, intel, and I was part of S1, administration. It wasn't until over a year later that I discovered the problem and reported it, and by that time, he'd already left the unit.

The incident was covered up so that no one would know about it, and I was directed to fill out an undated burn report that the CO signed and dated on the same day the warrant office originally picked up the photo. I never saw the photo again, but I doubt it was actually destroyed. I agree that there was no danger, and can't even remember much about the photo other than is was significantly better, 25 years ago, than what you see on google satellite maps today, and showed a big bomb crater. It really was a surprisingly good photo, and I think the TS designation had more to do with quality than content. But the whole mess left a bad taste in my mouth. I was party to covering up something that wasn't a matter of national security, but might embarrass someone or hurt their career. I'd already decided to get out and go back to school as soon as we got back.

Unfortunately, I think this sort of thing goes on way too much and a lot of stuff is classified or remains classified for exactly this reason, not to embarrass someone. As for the information contained in the current leak, most of it seems temporal and no longer needs protection. It's sorta like in the movie "In Harms Way" when John Wayne's character orders one of his officers to transmit a message saying they'd been attacked, and the officer asks, "and break radio silence?" To which, Wayne's character responds, "don't you think they know where we are by now?"

That goes for the heat seeking missile revelation too -- the only one's who didn't know they were shooting down U.S. aircraft with heat seeking missiles where the general public. The guys doing the shooting and the one's catching the missiles sure as hell knew about it.

The only information that should not have been made public were the names of informants, but since secret material really isn't kept all that secret, my question is not why or how was it leaked, but why was that information placed in a Secret message in the first place. That's totally irresponsible. There's no reason for it. The higher ups aren't going to call the guy up or drop by for tea. They should have classified it as Top Secret, probably under a special program, and used an alias in other messages. If you throw a guys name around and it gets to enough people, someone who shouldn't know is bound to find out. This is an extreme case where it got made public, but I'm more worried about our "allies" in the area. Classifying something Top Secret, even in a special compartment, doesn't mean it will never get out, but it sure cuts down on the number of people who get access. Practically anyone, and all officers, could have access to Secret messages. That's a lot of people.

Zoe watch:

It got down to 68 last night, so Zoe is really happy. She's hanging out under the boat today.

Boat watch:

It was a bit too humid to do much yesterday, but with nice weather expected for the next few days, I hope I can get the toerails finished. The first section looks pretty good, but I think it'll need a little more work. I think I'll use epoxy from now on, and once it's set, I'll drill small holes and fill them with epoxy to give it a bit more strength. I'll also pin the the splice, since it'll be the most likely place to fail.