July
23, 2002 8:45 a.m. Reckless
Reporting?
Loose
lips in times of war.
he
London Daily Telegraph crossword puzzle prepared for June 2, 1944,
four days before D-Day, contained the words "Overlord" and "Neptune."
The first was the codeword for the Allied invasion of northern Europe,
the second the code for the naval component of D-Day. The previous weeks'
puzzles contained the words "Utah" and "Omaha" —
the American landing beaches — and "Mulberry," the codename
for the top-secret temporary harbors to be deployed to support the invasion.
The Telegraph's senior puzzle designer, Leonard Dawe, a 54-year-old
schoolmaster from Surrey and World War I veteran, found himself the center
of MI5's attention
when senior military officers spotted Utah and Omaha in the same puzzle.
It turned out to be a coincidence, but it gave the D-Day planners a few
sleepless nights.
I thought about that
historical tidbit when I read Eric Schmitt's article, "U.S. Plan
for Iraq Is Said to Include Attack on 3 Sides," which appeared in
the July 5 New York Times. The article was based on an extensive
set of preliminary plans entitled "CentCom Courses of Action,"
which Schmitt had obtained by methods unknown. The 1944 incident seems
quaint by comparison — "tweedy English schoolmaster accidentally
stumbles across codewords for greatest invasion in history while assembling
puzzles" versus "irresponsible journalist reports on highly
classified war plans for no apparent reason." Schmitt writes that
the document "offers a rare glimpse into the inner sanctum of the
war planners assigned to think about options for defeating Iraq."
That's right, it is a rare glimpse, and rare for a reason. No one outside
military-planning circles needs to know about it. It is like a periodic
view into how to manufacture weapons of mass destruction or an occasional
look at the names of deep-cover operatives — it serves no useful
purpose, and could be distinctly harmful. As Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld
stated in a July 12 Defense Department memo, leaks of this nature are
"wrong ...against the law ...cost the lives of Americans ... and
diminish our country's chances for success."
Naturally, the Times
defended publication of the article with some lawyerly boilerplate, but
the statement does not stand scrutiny when interlaced with a few commonsense
questions: "We are satisfied that the article ... was consistent
with responsible citizenship...." How is this responsible, or representative
of citizenship? If this is responsible, what would irresponsible citizenship
look like? Or recklessness? "We took appropriate steps to determine
that while addressing matters of legitimate public concern..." What
steps were taken and how were they appropriate? How are the highly secret
specifics of war planning a legitimate public concern? "...we
were not jeopardizing current or prospective military operations."
How can this not jeopardize a prospective military operation, particularly
the attack scenario they compromised? How is the New York Times
even qualified to make that assessment, especially without consulting
the DOD? For all the Times or any of us in the outside world knows,
they could have blown the entire invasion plan right then.
The precise phrasing
of the Times statement may be have been dictated by the folks in
legal with a view towards liability, but as an affirmative argument it
is intellectually bankrupt. I doubt Schmitt's article could even pass
muster on First Amendment grounds. Not all classified information is legally
publishable once in the hands of the press. In an
NRO piece I wrote on a similar topic last October, I suggested that
prospective war reporters consult the 1931 Supreme Court decision Near
v. Minnesota in which Chief Justice Hughes wrote, "no one
would question but that a government might prevent … publication
of the sailing dates of transports or the number and location of troops."
As I wrote then, Hughes "held operational security (OPSEC) to be
a self-evident truth that 'no one would question.' The safety of the men
on the frontline is such an overriding countervailing state interest that
it even passes the test for prior restraint — not simply denying
access to troops, but banning publication of their whereabouts. This principle
was upheld even in New York Times Co. v. United States
(1971), the Pentagon Papers case, which in other respects gave great latitude
to the press." The latter case is particularly important in this
respect because it dealt with internal DOD documents published after the
fact, not, as in this case, when exposure could lead to possibly deadly
consequences for our men and women in uniform. Another D-Day tale has
it that some invasion planning documents blew out a window at one point
and were never recovered. Would they have been fair game for publication
as a legitimate public concern? Or would that have been at best criminal
stupidity, at worst punishable treason?
An important mitigating
factor in this affair is the fact that the Iraqi leadership is both pathologically
paranoid and habitually unable to comprehend American culture, so it will
never take the article at face value. The war plan cannot be genuine,
they will reason, by the very fact that it was divulged. It was not really
leaked, but intentionally made public as part of a misinformation plot.
On the other hand, perhaps it is genuine, and was published to make Saddam
think it isn't. Or, knowing they would figure out that much, a
fake plan was leaked to make them think it is the real plan in disguise.
Or, perchance the reverse. Such theories are already rampant in the Muslim
world. An Iranian commentator said that the Times, "which
tends to reflect the views of the Republicans" (see, they just do
not get us) published the piece to pressure the Iraqis at the negotiations
being held that week in Vienna to accept U.N. inspectors. Iraqi Foreign
Minister and chief negotiator Naji Sabri at first dismissed the article,
stating the Americans have already been attacking Iraq for eleven years,
but observers later claimed that the article made it impossible for Sabri
to seek a rapprochement, thus scuttled the talks. So the "plan"
worked — or failed — or maybe both — depending on which
conspiracy theory you choose to believe. Other reports noted the coincidence
of Schmitt's article with the meeting of Iraqi opposition groups in London,
or Deputy Secretary of Defense Wolfowitz's trip to Turkey. The Times
piece was intended to harm or help one or both, again depending on one's
conspiratorial premises. The London Observer published a lengthy
analysis on July
14 that looked at several theories of intrigue, from the White House
using the plan to divert headlines from financial scandals to the alleged
State/DOD rivalry. And of course my article today only feigns indignation
— or does it?
Schmitt's article
states that the real reason the documents were leaked was because his
frustrated source felt the war planning was "insufficiently creative."
Hard to see how this operational innovator will bring about the creative
change he wants by compromising the planning process, but perhaps he is
too smart for the rest of us. And he had better be, for his sake. The
Secretary of Defense has stated publicly that he would "dearly like"
to find the source or sources, and if found, they will be imprisoned.
According to yet another recent leak, the Air Force Office of Special
Investigations has been tasked with finding the person or persons who
handed over the planning document. Anyone think the NYT would like
to display some responsible citizenship and cooperate in this investigation?
Nah, me neither.
— James
S. Robbins is a national-security analyst & NRO contributor.
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London Daily Telegraph crossword puzzle prepared for June 2, 1944,
four days before D-Day, contained the words "Overlord" and "Neptune."
The first was the codeword for the Allied invasion of northern Europe,
the second the code for the naval component of D-Day. The previous weeks'
puzzles contained the words "Utah" and "Omaha" —
the American landing beaches — and "Mulberry," the codename
for the top-secret temporary harbors to be deployed to support the invasion.
The Telegraph's senior puzzle designer, Leonard Dawe, a 54-year-old
schoolmaster from Surrey and World War I veteran, found himself the center
of 
