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Pentagon Boss Is Not Sweating WikiLeaks
If Defense Secretary Robert Gates had anything to say about WikiLeaks’ unauthorized disclosure of U.S. diplomatic dispatches, it was this: everybody calm down.
WikiLeaks’ release of the often-undiplomatic diplomatic cables isn’t a “meltdown” or a “game-changer” for American foreign policy, an exasperated Gates intoned at a Pentagon press conference this afternoon. “Is this embarrassing? Yes. Is it awkward? Yes,” he continued. “Consequences for U.S. foreign policy? I think fairly modest. ”
That’s classic Gates. When WikiLeaks released an earlier cache of purloined U.S. documents — thousands of frontline military reports about Afghanistan — Admiral Michael Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, angrily suggested the transparency group had the blood of U.S. troops and Afghan civilians on its hands. Seated beside Mullen in July, Gates explained that the information-security breach meant the Pentagon would have to reevaluate its approach to pushing high-level intelligence out to a level where any potentially-disgruntled servicemember could access it.
Gates’ message this time around was that despite the leak — which, as our sister blog Threat Level first reported, happened months ago — new Pentagon security precautions were showing promise. About sixty percent of U.S.-based military computers now have an “automated capability” to register improper access. Servicemembers can’t copy material on secure military networks to CDs or DVDs, Gates said. (Pfc. Bradley Manning allegedly spirited away sensitive material on a CD-RW labeled “Lady Gaga.”) And the military has “longer-term efforts under way” to identify anomalies in who’s viewing what, “sort of like credit card companies do.”
It’s not that Gates didn’t find the forced transparency annoying. He dug up a John Adams quote: “How can a government go on, publishing all of their negotiations with foreign nations, I know not.”
But from his perspective, WikiLeaks won’t significantly disrupt U.S. foreign policy, because it doesn’t have the power to change basic geopolitical calculations. “Some governments deal with us because they fear us, some because they respect us, most because they need us,” Gates said. “We are still essentially, as has been said before, the indispensable nation.”
Photo: DoD
Pentagon Boss Is Not Sweating WikiLeaks
- By Spencer Ackerman
- November 30, 2010 |
- 10:06 pm |
- Categories: Info War
If Defense Secretary Robert Gates had anything to say about WikiLeaks’ unauthorized disclosure of U.S. diplomatic dispatches, it was this: everybody calm down.
WikiLeaks’ release of the often-undiplomatic diplomatic cables isn’t a “meltdown” or a “game-changer” for American foreign policy, an exasperated Gates intoned at a Pentagon press conference this afternoon. “Is this embarrassing? Yes. Is it awkward? Yes,” he continued. “Consequences for U.S. foreign policy? I think fairly modest. ”
That’s classic Gates. When WikiLeaks released an earlier cache of purloined U.S. documents — thousands of frontline military reports about Afghanistan — Admiral Michael Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, angrily suggested the transparency group had the blood of U.S. troops and Afghan civilians on its hands. Seated beside Mullen in July, Gates explained that the information-security breach meant the Pentagon would have to reevaluate its approach to pushing high-level intelligence out to a level where any potentially-disgruntled servicemember could access it.
Gates’ message this time around was that despite the leak — which, as our sister blog Threat Level first reported, happened months ago — new Pentagon security precautions were showing promise. About sixty percent of U.S.-based military computers now have an “automated capability” to register improper access. Servicemembers can’t copy material on secure military networks to CDs or DVDs, Gates said. (Pfc. Bradley Manning allegedly spirited away sensitive material on a CD-RW labeled “Lady Gaga.”) And the military has “longer-term efforts under way” to identify anomalies in who’s viewing what, “sort of like credit card companies do.”
It’s not that Gates didn’t find the forced transparency annoying. He dug up a John Adams quote: “How can a government go on, publishing all of their negotiations with foreign nations, I know not.”
But from his perspective, WikiLeaks won’t significantly disrupt U.S. foreign policy, because it doesn’t have the power to change basic geopolitical calculations. “Some governments deal with us because they fear us, some because they respect us, most because they need us,” Gates said. “We are still essentially, as has been said before, the indispensable nation.”
Photo: DoD
