War On Leaking Expands But Here's Hoping It Doesn't Succeed

There’s a new front in the war on leaks. This time it’s the U.S. Special Operations Command which is searching for the source of a story in the Army Times, an independent newspaper published for a military audience. The story, written by Sean Naylor, has not caused much of a public stir because it contains no news bulletins, but it is burning up the wires between the Pentagon and the Special Operations Command headquarters in Tampa, Florida, with vows to track down the leaker.

The story, entitled “Closing in on Zarqawi,” is, according to Pentagon officials, an extremely accurate account of special operations in Iraq which must have come from someone with access to inside information. In detail only a Pentagon reporter could love, Naylor outlines the organization of Task Force 145 – the outfit charged with tracking down Abu Musa al Zarqawi – and explains that the commander of the hunt is asking for still more troops to keep the pressure on. It even quotes from an e-mail written by the commander, Lt. Gen. Stan McChrystal.

The story won’t strike the average reader as an expose, but to someone like myself, who appreciates from long experience how tough a nut the Special Operations Command is to crack, it is a wonder. To receive even the most basic of briefings on their operations in Iraq, a military officer with a Top Secret clearance still has to sign a separate nondisclosure agreement. Yet there it all is, laid out in the pages of the Army Times.

Because of what I do for a living, you won’t be surprised to learn that I hope efforts to track down Naylor’s or any other reporter’s sources end in failure. But it’s not just because I don’t want anyone to be discouraged from leaking to me. I honestly believe that leaks have a moderating effect on the actions of government -- that whenever a policy gets too far out of line with standard practices someone on the inside will be outraged enough to leak it.

http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2006/05/02/publiceye/entry1569615.shtml

The Bushies now want to charge reporters who publish classified information leaked to them with ESPIONAGE. I doubt it will happen, but that's how their little nazi minds work.

Why doesn't someone clue in these hapless idiots that freedom can't be enforced?