US officials are scrambling to find the source of a leak of top-secret military and intelligence documents that went viral on the Internet last week, detailing a range of issues including the war in Ukraine.
U.S. officials have yet to find the source of the leak, and they have not confirmed the authenticity of the documents, which provide information about combat losses in Ukraine and details of training for Ukrainian forces.
US newspaper “The Hill” reported that the release of these documents was the most significant breach of US security information in a decade. Report It highlights some of the biggest intelligence leaks to rock Washington in American history:
The Pentagon Papers
In 1971, Daniel Ellsberg, a military analyst, leaked a top-secret U.S. Department of Defense study of the Vietnam War, known as the “Pentagon Papers,” which he worked on as a military contractor with the ministry.
The leak of the 7,000 documents caused a great uproar in the United States at the time, and was the starting point for the global fame of the “Washington Post” and “The New York Times” newspapers after their publication. The documents, and then other newspapers, published a decision by the U.S. administration at the time to stop publication, saying the documents were harmful to the country’s security.
However, the U.S. Supreme Court later allowed the release of these documents, which enforces the first article of the U.S. Constitution, which provides for freedom of the press and the right to information, and the Justice Department later dropped charges against Ellsberg for revealing state secrets.
The Pentagon Papers, which Ellsberg secretly filmed and leaked to the press, detail America’s decades-long involvement in Vietnam and confirm many anti-war critics.
Robert Hansen: Spy for the Soviet Union
In 1976, Robert Hansen began working as an undercover agent for the US Federal Bureau of Investigation. During his 25 years with the FBI and law enforcement agencies, Hansen spied for the Soviet Union and Russian intelligence services for the U.S. government.
Hansen worked as a spy for the Soviet Union throughout the Cold War, but for years he did his work unnoticed.
Working for the FBI, Hansen had access to classified information and sold thousands of documents and classified information to Soviet and Russian intelligence.
The documents contained details of US military plans and strategies for anti-nuclear war, as well as leaked US weapons technologies. He received a sum of money for selling this information over the years, estimated to be around $1.4 million in cash, and he also received several pieces of jewelry in exchange for his service to Russia and the Soviet Union.
American authorities arrested Hansen in 2000, just as he was about to retire, after receiving information from Russia that he was a spy for Moscow.
Hansen pleaded guilty to 15 counts of espionage later that year. He is now serving a life sentence in a Colorado state prison.
WikiLeaks: Iraq War Records Revealed
In 2010, WikiLeaks, a website founded by Julian Assange, began mass publishing leaked classified military documents detailing the practices of US and coalition forces during the US war on Iraq between 2004 and 2009.
The leaks revealed disturbing truths about the war, including the large number of civilian casualties, as it revealed that 66,000 Iraqi civilians had been killed by 2009, or more than 60% of those who died during the war. It also revealed that hundreds of civilians were killed at the hands of coalition forces.
The leaked documents also shed light on the grave abuses perpetrated by US forces in the prisons against Iraqi prisoners, even after widespread abuses were reported at the Abu Ghraib prison in the early stages of the war.
The leaks include about 400,000 documents ranging from reports and records prepared by soldiers who participated in the war on Iraq.
The leaks helped weaken public support for the war even more than it did at the start of the US administration’s decision to invade Iraq in 2003.
Edward Snowden: The NSA Leaks
In 2013, US intelligence agent Edward Snowden released documents revealing that the US government secretly monitored millions of Americans through a surveillance program that began after the September 11, 2001 attacks.
Snowden’s leaks shed light on the extent of US surveillance of citizens, including spying on their phone calls, emails and online conversations.
It exposed America’s intelligence services, some of which were Washington’s allies, through a spying program, including “Prisma,” a U.S. program to monitor telephone and Internet communications. The leaks show the US administration bugged several European Union offices and spied on at least 38 foreign embassies.
A trove of classified documents leaked by Snowden has embarrased the administration of US President Barack Obama and strained its relations with several countries – some of them allies – angered by Washington’s eavesdropping on their leaders’ conversations and their citizens’ communications and emails. .
Ukrainian War Leak
“The Hill’s” newspaper reported that the leak of alleged NATO documents related to the war in Ukraine a few days ago is considered one of the largest military and intelligence breaches in the history of the United States.
The leaked documents, whose authenticity and provenance have not yet been confirmed by authorities, provide interesting information about the war in Ukraine. It also details US and Western military support for Ukraine.
The leaked documents also suggested the US was spying on the leaders of Russia and Ukraine to monitor the course of the war, the newspaper reported.
It also details how the US monitors Russia’s military movements using satellites.
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