By Rishaan Chowdhury
Since the beginning of the United States, espionage has always been a crucial aspect of the nation’s foreign policy, with spies abroad helping the U.S. and spies at home harming it. During the Revolutionary War people such as Nathan Hale spied for the United States behind British lines, benefiting the revolutionary cause greatly. During World War II, British spies helped benefit the Allied cause by misleading German officials and misinforming high ranking Nazis of troop landings, saving thousands of American soldiers' lives. Additionally, the Cold War was notorious for being filled with tales of espionage and intelligence gathering by the United States and the Soviet Union. The CIA assessed the Soviet military thoroughly and reported military and nuclear advancements by the Soviet Union to the United States. In turn the notorious Soviet agency – the KGB – operated under the cover of embassies in the United States and its allies. The United States and Russia’s deep rivalry has led to both nation’s espionage apparatuses being deeply entrenched in the other country. However, since the Soviet Union’s collapse in the 1990’s it was much less known as to the extent of U.S. intelligence into Russian operations. Furthermore the United States has turned its attention to terrorism in recent decades and the CIA has become more focused on combating terrorism and gathering intelligence about terrorist organizations.
Over the past two months, classified Pentagon documents appeared on the popular social media platform, Discord. Such documents featured extensive information on U.S. intelligence in its foes and allies. This leak could cause severe damage to foreign relations between the United States and its allies, as well as strain fragile diplomatic relations the U.S. has with its adversaries such as China and Russia. These documents disclosed how much intelligence the United States has on Russia, showing that almost every government branch has been penetrated by the CIA. Since the outbreak of the Ukraine war, the United States and Ukraine have pursued a more trusted relationship, and intelligence sharing between the two nations has grown. Detailed information on the Russian military’s operations in Ukraine, such as missile targets and tactical operations appear to have been shared with Ukraine and Ukraine’s success in the war owes some to these documents. According to a source close to Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelensky, Ukraine has already altered some military plans due to the leak, showing how reliant Ukraine’s defense is on the United States. Additionally, the documents expose the U.S.’ extensive intelligence on its allies, such as Israel and South Korea, frustrating diplomats and harming crucial allied relationships. Such startling information on allies includes detailed transcripts of a conversation between two South Korean officials discussing whether to send the U.S. ammunition for Ukraine and how that could violate South Korea’s policies. Furthermore, intelligence on Israel’s intelligence agency, the Mossad, reveals that the Mossad had been encouraging protests against the country's new government, “including several explicit calls to action” according to CNN. Additionally, the reports reveal the United States close watch over Ukrainian leadership, and their extensive information about Ukraine. It is noteworthy that the United States has less intelligence on Ukraine than on Russia according to these documents. The extensive information on Ukraine has led Ukraine to denounce the documents as fakes. In Israel, the Prime Minister’s office issued a statement repeatedly denying that the Mossad has encouraged protests. In Seoul, South Korean officials have said they will raise the matter with Washington.
The alarming aspects of this leak exist beyond the fact that confidential information was revealed to the public. It shows how the United States has mistrust in so many of its allies that it has gathered numerous amounts of intelligence on its allies’ governments. Additionally, the extensive information on Russia and China leads many to wonder how much intelligence they have on the United States. If the United States is capable of penetrating almost every government organization of Russia then it is likely that they in turn have penetrated most of our government as well. Finally the issue of the leak remerges. While the United States hunts for the source of the leak, it becomes increasingly alarming that one person can reveal so much about the United States’ intelligence apparatus without getting caught. If the United States government possesses so much sensitive intelligence on its allies and foes then it is crucial that that information is secured safely in order to prevent damage to fragile diplomatic relationships and crucial allyships.
Another staggering item of this leak is the fact that the culprit, Massachusetts National Guardsman Jack Texeira is only 23 has released intelligence that could shatter crucial diplomatic relationships that could bring the world to a war. Additionally, Texeira could face up to fifteen years in prison if found guilty for both charges. A sad fact of Mr. Texeira’s actions is that a young U.S. service member who had an entire life before him could spend a large portion of it imprisoned and will have his reputation tarnished. Furthermore, this leak highlights the United States’ incapacity to protect such sensitive information if a young national guardsman is capable of revealing such classified information. Currently it is unclear why Texeira had access to these documents and whether he acted alone.
Conclusively, the United States’ amount of intelligence on foreign nations is staggering and reveals the mistrust the United States has on its allies and the extent to U.S. intelligence on its adversaries. It appears that the government possesses amounts of information on foreign nations and conflicts much more than most people are aware of. According to these documents it reveals that the United States has predicted many of Russia’s moves and some of Ukraine’s success owes to U.S. intelligence. Additionally, this leak and the staggering amount of information it contains displays how much the public is kept in the dark on the government's operations and how the United States may have more intelligence domestically than it appears.