The Whitehouse has understandably gone spare about these further breaches of security – they already have a serving military officer on charge for the leak of the Apache footage earlier this year. The official position is that: “We [the Whitehouse] strongly condemn the disclosure of classified information by individuals and organisations, which puts the lives of the US and partner service members at risk and threatens our national security. Wikileaks made no effort to contact the US government about these documents, which may contain information that endanger the lives of Americans, our partners, and local populations who co-operate with us.” They also point out that the documents refer mainly to the era of George W Bush, and not the Obama-era, if one can call it that.
The problem with intelligence leaks is the law of unintended consequences. Just as in my previous post and the discussion that followed, clearance is granted on a need to know basis, and usually carefully monitored to avoid security breaches, and in intelligence terms to avoid undermining the value of the intelligence. If you read Richard Aldrich’s cracking new book on GCHQ you’ll see a myriad of examples in his chapters on 1941 to the end of the 1950s on this kind of (often unsuccessful) information control. But, in this case, wikileaks and those who have syndicated the material have no idea (despite their statement that they have tried to protect human source.. but how would they know how to do this, they’re not security professionals?) which of the pages they have presented might give a shard of a clue about operational art, intelligence tactics or informants etc that they can act upon. It’s the sort of own-goal that prompted the old wartime mantra of ‘keep-mum’…. And it is clear from the Whitehouse’s statement that wikileaks hadn’t sought to confirm or check-out that this dump-leak wouldn’t do this kind of damage. It is clearly the moment when the coalition should start encoding its own transmissions for internal viewing (in addition to its standard sigint encryption for over-the-air transmission), so that any leaks happen in code, rather than in plain English.
So, what do we learn from the documents. Well, we learn that that Taliban have acquired better kit than we might have expected (heat-seeking missiles), but given the regional powers who might enjoy or benefit from coalition suffering, we might have already expected this. We learn that special forces hunt down (and kill?) Taliban leaders. I’m not sure why this is news; were we meant to expect them to deliver a bunch of flowers and a box of chocolates? The use of UAVs is increasing; well, the technology is developing and efforts have obviously been on reducing coalition casualties. The documents also list (but bare in mind they exist in a as-it-happened-form and so are likely to be inaccurate) the so-called ‘blue-on-white’ incidents where civilians were killed. I am certainly not in the camp that easily dismisses such things; each case is deeply tragic, but not unexpected.
So, do these documents tell us something intrinsically new? No.
But they do provide a mine of rich empirical detail, which will allow campaigners and even enterprising scholars interested in this area to wave narratives about war-fighting and the civilian experience of war. Where the documents show the coalition to have been ‘naive’ (the word the BBC kept using), it might prove to be an opportunity or a point of departure for learning lessons. One would hope that it doesn’t take the repeated actions of this campaigning website to prompt it; and one also has to hope that they haven’t done more harm than good.
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Time and time again, cases like this just reinforced the point that you can employ strictest access control policies and the best technology in the world but the human will always be the weakest link.
Might we soon begin to see a renaissance of the old paper-based system in that the latest and greatest technology is still no match for photocopies on red paper :)
This is my take on the situation
http://www.thinkdefence.co.uk/2010/07/wiki-leaks/
In it, you say, “Let’s forget the fact that they reveal precisely nothing that isn’t already well known and enjoy the frothing from the left and right.”
I would respectfully point out that the leaked documents are likely to contain a great deal of information useful to some very bad people (locals co-operating with ISAF, ISAF tactics, intelligence sources and capabilities), and which wasn’t already well known to them. Still, if it only endangers the lives of NATO soldiers, perhaps that doesn’t trouble you?
Sorry Ed but that is a ridiculous statement to make.
Just because I question the actual value beyond the shock horror then I don’t care about ISAF or local forces is clearly rather a jump. This will be hyped by the newspapers for weeks to come but will make precisely zero difference to anything that matters.
You say ‘likely’, have you read them all then, the youngest is over 18 months old.
I think it is over hyped and the more we foam and froth the more we prolong things.
The left will hail it as a great victory for free speech and a vindication of their objections and the right will complain about OPSEC and raise the demons of ISAF casualties being caused by the leaks.
From the ones I have read and the analysis so far in the newspapers they don’t see to tell us anything we or the Taleban did not already know.
If this is subsequently changes then fair enough, I will change my view but as it stands I think we should be concerning ourselves with the conduct of operations driven by a coherent strategy not with the release of a load of low level data from 18 months ago.
This talk of “left” and “right” is a bit Punch and Judy for me. I’m sure you know more about it.
You said the leaked intelligence reports “reveal precisely nothing that isn’t already well known“. As other commenters here have pointed out, the leaked reports will certainly give hints as to how ISAF conducts operations, tactics, and how they relate to locals in ways that the enemy can and will exploit. You seem to be dismissing this because the reports are at least 18 months old. First of all, I’m not clear how December 2009 (which is the date the Grauniad gives as the end of the covered period) to July 2010 is 18 months. Perhaps you got confused about which year this is. Even if it had been 18 months and not 7, how quickly do you think tactics change? How quickly do hitherto friendly locals move house?
Charitably, I infer that you realise you made an error of overstatement in saying the reports reveal “precisely nothing”. I don’t know why you’re sticking to that.
Finally, do you seriously and honestly believe that the Taleban and AQ’s intelligence people aren’t poring over every one of those reports, looking for stuff that will help their efforts? Do you seriously and honestly believe they won’t find stuff that will materially help them in their operational methods and/or who to target? I genuinely would like to know your view on these points.
Yes, I got the dates wrong and apologise for that but I still think they reveal nothing of any value either to the observer or participant
Perhaps the words ‘precisely nothing’ were a bit too strong, how about ‘almost precisely nothing’
I will change the post because you are right, there is a very slim outside chance that there may be something of value
Accusing me of not being troubled by endangerment to NATO troops is precisely wrong though, I care a lot, just because I don’t see much value in this storm in a teacup does not change that.
All the column inches and time being devoted to this nonsense is time and column inches not being devoted to things of more importance to those NATO soldiers you seem to think I don’t care about.
Just a thought
I would also add, most of the data relates to actions in which the people we are worrying about were actually there, the ANSF seem to be as leaky as a sieve and have numerous members who work both sides and would transfer tactical information, the ISI and numerous other intelligence agencies operate all over the area.
I would suspect that if they want to know how we operate at a tactical and operational level they simply need to open their eyes, ears and mouths.
Stepping back from the moral arguments (which the last time wikileaks leaked something were curiously to the opposite of what they are now, possibly to do with who is getting killed but I digress) and the value of the information released (be it PR, propaganda or intel) I wonder if there will be any effect on the conduct of the war itself from this info?
Specifically is this leak this wars Pentagon Papers (my guess is not but who knows) and (as mentioned in the OP) does this constitute anything new that we didnt know.
I do think there is a mine of small data to be pulled from such information, certainly when it’s in such bulk but unlike the Pentagon Papers this appears to be in the raw and not processed.
If anything it may turn out to be the footnotes to the failure of operations in Afghanistan and the fact that there is an elephant in the room.
To me this whole situation reflects the confused policy goals which have been in place from the beginning.
Where was the interest in Afghanistan between 2002-2008 when the current situation was put in to place? Essentially a strategic vacuum for six years. The emphasis of the US and UK was on Iraq which was very much a “war of choice” facilitated by the precedence of the Afghan campaign of 2001.
The policy in 2001 was in Clausewitzian terms the total overthrow of the Taliban government and its replacement with . . . well that is the problem is it not? A war of unlimited war aims instititgated by the US/NATO as a response to 9/11. The response did not really fit the cause, which could have been the suppression of Al Qaida in Afghanistan but with the retention of the Taliban government since we had nothing to replace it with. Instead, following Bush, NATO chose an essentially unlimited war for the (re)making of Afghanistan . . . something that we had not the resources or will to undertake.
The leaks are simply a result/characteristic of the political/policy confusion at the highest levels which has been in place since 2001 . . . blame the politicos, not wikileaks.