quote:

Originally posted by saigonsmuggler:
Isn't the claim that these documents were first posted in Russian telegram accounts and thus could've been modified by Russians for propaganda?

The original images on Discord and then 4chan showed 16-17.5k Ukrainian KIA (which is however just a straight copy-and-paste of the official Ukrainian statements) and 35.5-43.5k Russian. When they subsequently turned up on the pro-Russian "Donbass Devushka" Telegram channel, the Russian numbers had been (rather crudely) shopped over with the Ukrainian ones, and the latter jumbled to read 61-71.5k. Bellingcat first did the complete reverse track, though their site is little helpful in evidence since they blurred the images in the screenshots. But even two days earlier, people were noting the sequence, like on Kim Dotcom's Twitter channel where I first saw it (though those pointing it out have since been removed).

Overall, people following events in Ukraine have commented how low-grade the intelligence is for something classified "top secret". Most of it can be gleaned from open sources, like those official Ukrainian KIA numbers or the deliveries of Western armored vehicles; though the assignment to specific brigades and their training levels are new. The slides include quite precise locations, numbers and combat effectiveness of Russian units, but are vague on those of Ukraine, which they try to explain by having low confidence in Ukrainian information. Considering that they also imply the US is eavesdropping on the Ukrainian government, that seems strange; the suspicion is that better intelligence is available, but classified even higher.

The whole thing points to two connected problems with US practice: overclassifying information, then oversharing it for the classification level. Basically, copying and pasting from open sources, slapping "top secret" on it, then putting it on an intranet where any junior enlisted twenty-something with personality issues (hi Chelsea) can access anything without "need to know" because nobody wants another 9/11 due to information not shared. Of course the possibility remains it's an intentional leak or a sting operation with bad intelligence, and Airman Minecraft was set up. But in the documents not directly relating to Ukraine in particular is quite a bit of actual sensitive information, not least US spying on allied governments (though that's not really a surprise either), so that's less likely the more comes out.

quote:

https://www.washingtontimes.co...ntagon-papers-again/

Believe nothing coming from this cultist rag.
I wouldn’t line a digital birdcage of an AI parrot with this garbage paper.

quote:

Originally posted by ScreamingCockatoo:

quote:

https://www.washingtontimes.co...ntagon-papers-again/

Believe nothing coming from this cultist rag.
I wouldn’t line a digital birdcage of an AI

parrot with this garbage paper.

I went looking for the actual slides and could'nt find them.

Have to agree with the comment that Fox and Washington Times are not exactly credible - just the polar opposite.

I am beginning to think this kid just blew up his life to post a bunch of "nothing".

If the Russians didn't guess they were deeply leaking secrets they are dumber that they act.

The Russian ace in the hole is Biden/Austin/Miley ... Can you imagine if GHWB was running things ...

The 21 Year Old Leaker — Something Is Not Right



The media obsession in vilifying Jack Texeira for “leaking” TOP SECRET and SECRET documents and judging him guilty without any benefit of doubt, is just another symptom of the authoritarian fever that grips many inhabitants of the United States. Forget the first amendment. Stay in the dark and trust the Government to tell you what you need to know. Before you join the mob eager to lynch the poor kid, let me share what some of my friends who are veterans of the CIA and the Air Force have said about this affair in the past few days.



Both men say that the story and alleged facts smell to high heaven. One longtime buddy, a veteran of the CIA, still provides consulting services to the U.S. Government and holds the same high clearances that he had prior to his retirement. He is an experienced operations officer. He has recruited foreigners to spy on behalf of the United States, managed highly classified programs and planned and executed many covert actions. In other words, he is no desk jockey.



We started working together 18 years ago in providing training support to a variety of military commands by writing and executing military exercises. All of our work was conducted in a SCIF and we had the clearances that gave us access to TOP SECRET, COMPARTMENTED INTELLIGENCE. I stopped doing that work five years ago but he has continued on.



During our 18 years of working on these highly classified exercises we have never seen a E3 (i.e., an Airman First Class) anywhere in the SCIF. The enlisted personnel who worked on these TOP SECRET exercises were at least a Staff Sergeant (E5). So what is a lowly E3 doing in a SCIF with TOP SECRET material and no supervision? That is the first red flag.



Another red flag, as I noted in my previous piece, is the partial copy of the CIA Operations Center Intelligence Report. Both of us have had access to CIA systems available on the military servers and we have never seen the CIA Ops Center report on any of those systems. Never! How did this 21 year old kid get his hands on that?



I was chatting today with another friend. He’s of more recent vintage. I discovered he is a retired U.S. Air Force Colonel and that his last job with the Air Force was the inspection, certification and monitoring of Air Force SCIFs. Wow! Talk about serendipity. I asked him what he thought of the story the media is hard selling about the 21 year old with a trove of TS leaked documents? He told me, “It does not make sense.”.



He made the same points as my CIA buddy — how does a 21 year old E3 have this kind of access? My retired Colonel never saw it during his career. He told me, “At most, kids this age, might have a SECRET clearance.”



He also made the same observation that I raised in my previous piece on this incident — where the hell was this airman’s chain of command? A lowly E3 is not going to have unfettered access to a SCIF and will always have at least one senior commander (NCO or Officer) present to tell him what to do and to monitor his work.



Something is askew with the media story being presented to the World about the boy who posted the leak on the gamer chat board. The documents are not randomly selected. If the intent was to post classified information in order to impress a bunch of teenage gamers then why is the bulk of the material only about the war in Ukraine?



Finally, we are told, according to the Washington Post, that there are 300 documents. Really? Where are they? I have only been able to find roughly 18 documents. Have any of your seen the 100 pages that the media insists were posted to the web? That discrepancy alone raises another big red flag for me. Why was the Washington Post allowed to read/see 300 highly classified documents? The Post reporters do not hold security clearances. But it is okay for them to review those documents.



One of the major revelations from this leaking incident is that most of the press in the United States have rejected the fundamental mission of the media — expose truths the Government wants to hide from the public. What a volte face!! Fifty years ago the New York Times and the Washington Post led the way in defying the Nixon Adminstration’s effort to quash the publication of the highly classified Pentagon Papers. Those documents revealed that the U.S. Government, under both Republican and Democrat Presidents, lied to the American public about the war in Vietnam. And today? Those two media outlets enthusiastically helping the U.S. Government identify the leaker and smear him in the process. So much for the viability of the First Amendment.



https://www.thegatewaypundit.c...ething-is-not-right/



.

quote:

Originally posted by AzMikeCFD102:

During our 18 years of working on these highly classified exercises we have never seen a E3 (i.e., an Airman First Class) anywhere in the SCIF.

Then how do you explain Chelsea Manning? He/she was a lowly PFC.

During Vietnam war I was a 21 year old draftee E-5 with Top Secret clearance and 3 "sensitivity" levels above TS. Of course those long gone days we had honor as our guiding star. If convicted or enters a guilty plea this E-3 needs a good long timeout in the Bureau of Prions as an example of what happens when you betray your country.

quote:

Originally posted by ScreamingCockatoo:

quote:

https://www.washingtontimes.co...ntagon-papers-again/

Believe nothing coming from this cultist rag.
I wouldn’t line a digital birdcage of an AI parrot with this garbage paper.

In reading a number of their articles they seem to be on the right side of things. Why do you believe The Washington Times is not a valid source of news and opinion?

quote:

Originally posted by abnmacv:
...If convicted or enters a guilty plea this E-3 needs a good long timeout in the Bureau of Prions as an example of what happens when you betray your country.

I agree. Bradley Manning also deserved a long time out, but he served a mere seven years before getting a pardon from Obama.

The conspiracy theories have started right on schedule, I see.

quote:

Originally posted by marksman41:

quote:

Originally posted by ScreamingCockatoo:

quote:

https://www.washingtontimes.co...ntagon-papers-again/

Believe nothing coming from this cultist rag.
I wouldn’t line a digital birdcage of an AI parrot with this garbage paper.

In reading a number of their articles they seem to be on the right side of things. Why do you believe The Washington Times is not a valid source of news and opinion?

Yeah... I don't get it either.
It's an opinion piece by Andrew Napolitano. I don't always agree with him, but he's not crazy.
I don't know how you can dismiss his argument with the "lining a digital birdcage" comment:

Does the government work for us, or do we work for the government?

Can the government morally steal data about allies and enemies and then make it a crime to reveal that data, even when the revelation shows that the government has been lying about killing? What to do about high-ranking government officials who lie about war? When the First Amendment states that “Congress shall make no law abridging … the freedom of speech,” does it really mean NO LAW?

All these questions came to mind as I attempted to digest the significance of the recent leak of top-secret documents from what appears to be a Pentagon briefing on the status of military operations in Ukraine.

In all, about 50 documents appear to have been printed off a computer and taken out of a secure federal facility and then photographed. The photos were then uploaded to various websites. The essence of the revelations is that Russia is killing seven Ukrainian troops for every one of its own that Ukrainians are killing, Ukrainian air defenses are projected to collapse totally by the end of next month, and the U.S. has excellent sources of Russian military plans, so good that the Pentagon is able to inform its Ukrainian counterparts of Russian troop movements and air assaults before they occur.

Do the math. A 7-to-1 kill ratio is a slaughter that cannot endure much longer. So, when Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin tells the Senate Armed Services Committee he expects Ukraine to do well militarily this spring and next winter, how can he reconcile his statements to that kill ratio?

The U.S. government is deeply committed to aiding Ukraine in its resistance to Russian forces in ways not even known to members of Congress, the media or the American public. Stated differently, the U.S. is at war with Russia.

quote:

Originally posted by abnmacv:
If convicted or enters a guilty plea this E-3 needs a good long timeout in the Bureau of Prions as an example of what happens when you betray your country.

Unfortunately, such an eventuality would be an outlier, not an example. Plenty of folks at the top of the current regime betray this country on a regular basis, even being on China's payroll, while the FBI and media give them a pass for it. I'm not real excited about seeing a kid made an example of when there are older and much more important adults guilty of far worse.

quote:

Originally posted by stiab:

quote:

Originally posted by AzMikeCFD102:

During our 18 years of working on these highly classified exercises we have never seen a E3 (i.e., an Airman First Class) anywhere in the SCIF.

Then how do you explain Chelsea Manning? He/she was a lowly PFC.

I'm sure things are different now, I haven't been inside a SCIF since the 90s, but based on what I read he had an account on JWICS, logged and and copied or downloaded a bunch of stuff. I think Manning may have done the same. Access to JWICS is probably from a standard computer inside a locked room where everyone who works there has a combination to get in but that room may not itself be a SCIF. The SCIFs I was in were smaller rooms (sometimes very small) inside the larger rooms that held the most sensitive stuff (and may not have even had computers inside, though I can't remember). To get in to the SCIF you had to have been 'read on' to additional programs that permitted you access, Top Secret is just the 'entryway' to more sensitive stuff, but if all you need is Top Secret to login to JWICS and the documents are there isn't not a surprise how he got them, no matter how young he is.

quote:

It's an opinion piece by Andrew Napolitano. I don't always agree with him, but he's not crazy.

Oh, let's think out that preface, right there...

quote:

Originally posted by BansheeOne:
The whole thing points to two connected problems with US practice: overclassifying information,

This.
My understanding is the sheer volume of material that is deemed sensitive enough to have a required classification level is simply overwhelming and is a very difficult to track and monitor, not to mention some of what is being slapped with a security clearance is somewhat trivial.

quote:

Originally posted by stiab:

quote:

Originally posted by AzMikeCFD102:

During our 18 years of working on these highly classified exercises we have never seen a E3 (i.e., an Airman First Class) anywhere in the SCIF.

Then how do you explain Chelsea Manning? He/she was a lowly PFC.

Because Manning's MOS was an Intel Analyst. If you're working within a staff unit, especially where you're handing sensitive materials, you're going to get screened for a handling Classified Information. This clown, like Manning, has access however their job was simply to be a secretary for their senior, separating and categorizing the info or, putting together packages for somebody else. The author is looking for a smell where one doesn't exist, and exposes how much he's either been away from being operational or, his prior work was limited.

A 21-year-old E3? Was he a late enlistee or had he been broken back?

flashguy

quote:

Originally posted by BansheeOne:
The whole thing points to two connected problems with US practice: overclassifying information, then oversharing it for the classification level.

I was watching an interview Shawn Ryan did with a retired CIA spy last week who said this exact same thing. They were talking about UAP/UFO's at the time, but he got on this tangent and said our government has a habit of classifying everything, including really inane, unimportant stuff and then just keeping it classified. The segment was taped before this whole thing came out. The second problem, they didn't touch on, but wanting to make sure information is available and then shared post-9/11 to prevent another such thing from happening is understandable, but it looks like it may have been a contributing factor here.

Para beat me to it, but this was done purely for e-clout reasons. Anyone with a Discord server, anyone who is in a Discord server, or anyone who has been in one where anything remotely political has been discussed will now be looked at. A few weeks ago, I joined one for night vision to chat and learn, and one of the guys in there had a warning tag under his name I'd never seen before. "This user is a suspected member of a hate group and is being monitored. Please report any suspicious or illegal behavior or comments." I searched for comments he'd made and as far as I could tell, he was just a young guy and a conservative. I didn't see that he'd said anything that wouldn't fly here. They're definitely watching.

EVERY annual OCA training class ends with:

"When in doubt, max it out"...

quote:

Originally posted by lbj:


If it's true special forces are on the ground, it means we are involved in a hot war with the Russians which IMO is a big mistake.

This administration is not just lying but their policy making decisions are wildly inappropriate.

Appropriate or not on the decisions to have US Troops (ie- SOCOM) involved in this conflict is a topic for tomorrow. TODAY because of this leak, there are OUR TROOPS out there that this fucktard just put in danger because he leaked this information.

Green Beret / MARSOC / SEAL types that are out there as force multipliers or whatever other duties they are involved in, just got compromised!

How big of a feather in the cap of Russia is it if they capture or kill an American involved with Ukraine? It's one thing if it's someone that's former Military. Imagine if it's Sgt (Army-Marine) / PO1 "Smith" from Kansas that got captured?

Don't forget that as soon as the leak became public Russia was immediately blamed for it, and it was reported Russia changed the data. So the seven Ukrainian deaths for one Russian death may or may not be true. One thing is for certain, our government lies to us as much as foreign adversaries do. I remember during the Vietnam War the government would release body counts of dead NVA and Viet Cong on a regular basis, it was always unrealistically high.


Russia likely behind U.S. military document leak, U.S. officials say

https://news.yahoo.com/russia-...l?fr=sycsrp_catchall

Russia or pro-Russian elements are likely behind the leak of several classified U.S. military documents posted on social media that offer a partial, month-old snapshot of the war in Ukraine, three U.S. officials told Reuters on Friday, while the Justice Department said separately it was probing the leak.

The documents appear to have been altered to lower the number of casualties suffered by Russian forces, the U.S. officials said, adding their assessments were informal and separate from the investigation into the leak itself.

The U.S. officials spoke on condition of anonymity given the sensitivity of the matter and declined to discuss the documents in any detail.

One document posted on social media said 16,000 to 17,500 Russian forces had been killed since Russia's Feb. 24, 2022, invasion of Ukraine.

The United States believes the actual figure is much higher, at around 200,000 Russians killed and wounded, officials have said.

More at link.

quote:

Originally posted by marksman41:
In reading a number of their articles they seem to be on the right side of things. Why do you believe The Washington Times is not a valid source of news and opinion?

Moon is a cultist. A manipulative cultist.

"Moon has said that when he was fifteen years old Jesus anointed him to carry out his unfinished work by becoming parent to all of humanity"


Believe NOTHING from these people.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: parabellum,