[FoxNews] Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth attempts to set the record straight on the Atlantic article.
| Secretary Hegseth was responding to this story: |
US cabinet officials accidentally add journalist to group chat, share war plans
[IsraelTimes] Trump adviser Mike Waltz inexplicably includes The Atlantic editor Jeffrey Goldberg in encrypted messaging chat to plan bombing campaign against Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen
Trump administration officials earlier this month accidentally added the editor of The Atlantic magazine to an encrypted group chat, in which they discussed highly sensitive plans for the military to strike Iranian-backed Iran's Houthi sock puppets
 ...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the Believing Youth . Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi is said to be the spiritual leader of the group and most of the military leaders are his relatives. The legitimate Yemeni government has accused the them of having ties to the Iranian government. Honest they did. The group has managed to gain control over all of Saada Governorate and parts of Amran, Al Jawf and Hajjah Governorates. Its slogan is God is Great, Death to America™, Death to Israel, a curse on the Jews They like shooting off... ummm... missiles that they would have us believe they make at home in their basements. On the plus side, they did murder Ali Abdullah Saleh, which was the only way the country was ever going to be rid of him...
rebels in Yemen
...an area of the Arabian Peninsula sometimes mistaken for a country. It is populated by more antagonistic tribes and factions than you can keep track of...
The incident was made public on Monday, in an article by Jeffrey Goldberg, who was included in the chat. The US National Security Council confirmed the messages appeared to be authentic, and said it was investigating how Goldberg was inadvertently added.
The group, on the Signal messaging app, included Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio
...The diminutive 13-year-old Republican U.S. Senator from Florida, Secretary of State in the second Trump administration...
, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard, Mideast envoy Steve Witkoff, and 12 other officials.
US President Donald Trump
...His ancestors didn't own any slaves...
, asked Monday about the story, was apparently unfamiliar with it, and said he was "not a big fan of The Atlantic," and that the leak must not have caused problems, because the attacks were successful.
The officials used the chat — to which Goldberg was added, for reasons unclear, on March 13 — to debate the merits of striking the Houthis and how to present the attacks to the public.
Hegseth, according to the texts, was worried that Israel would hit the Houthis first.
As part of the chat, Goldberg received, some two hours before the bombing began on March 15, a "plan [that] included precise information about weapons packages, targets, and timing."
That post, sent to the group by Hegseth at 11:44 a.m., "contained operational details of forthcoming strikes on Yemen, including information about targets, weapons the US would be deploying, and attack sequencing," Goldberg wrote.
The plans were sent to the group following a lengthy discussion between the vice president, the defense secretary, and a user identified as "S M" — presumably Trump confidant Stephen Miller — in which Vance complained about "bailing Europa
...the land mass occupying the space between the English Channel and the Urals, also known as Moslem Lebensraum...
out again" and insisted that "messaging [be] tight" and that risks to Saudi oil facilities be mitigated.
They were followed up with confirmation that the strikes had been successful, and a series of congratulatory messages, and celebratory emojis, from the various cabinet officials.
On Sunday, Goldberg exited the group, triggering a notice to the group’s creator, Waltz. No one from the group reached out to him about the situation, however, and it was not until he emailed Waltz and sent him a message on Signal that NSC Spokesman Brian Hughes reached out to Goldberg to confirm the veracity of the chat.
"This appears to be an authentic message chain, and we are reviewing how an inadvertent number was added to the chain," Hughes wrote.
"The thread is a demonstration of the deep and thoughtful policy coordination between bigwigs. The ongoing success of the Houthi operation demonstrates that there were no threats to troops or national security," he added.
National security lawyers interviewed by The Atlantic said that sharing classified information over Signal — a commercial messaging app known for its encryption, and, according to the magazine, used by national security officials for lower-level purposes such as scheduling — was unheard of and potentially illegal.
In addition, Waltz set some of the messages to disappear after one week, and others to disappear after four, raising questions about whether the messages were records that the government is obligated to preserve.
The US launched military strikes against Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthis on March 15 over the group’s attacks against Red Sea shipping, and have continued Arclight airstrike
...KABOOM! ...
s against the group in the weeks since, as the Houthis have claimed to fire at American warships.
Goldberg is the journalist who published a hoax story claiming Trump called slain U.S. veterans “suckers” and “losers.”
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