For days, about a hundred U.S. government documents from a secret briefing encompassing everything from the state of Russian and Ukrainian weapons to internal South Korean deliberations on sales of artillery shells have been circulating online, leaked by an unknown party with access.
Like most questions of public policy, the response to this leak is a balancing act. The federal government unquestionably over-classifies materials and uses secrecy as a cudgel to avoid accountability and dodge having to explain controversial programs to the public. The protections of obscurity can breed indifference, arrogance and excess in federal agencies.
Leaks like Edward Snowden’s revelations of the globally interconnected and largely unrestricted data collection by the National Security Agency and other elements of the U.S. and allies’ intelligence apparatuses are sometimes the only thing that can bring abuses to light. The government’s recent zeal for utilizing the Espionage Act to go after whistleblowers and journalists is disgraceful and has no place in a free and fair society where leaders must answer to the public. Leaking information, including so-called national security information, is often the sole remedy.
But this case is not about whistleblowers exposing Washington’s excesses. These top secret military assessments spilling out for anyone to see, including the Kremlin’s war planners trying to destroy Ukraine, can very seriously harm not only our but allied countries’...
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