One of the documents, dated February 23, describes in detail how Ukraine’s S300 air defense systems would be exhausted by May 2 at the current rate of use.
Aerial view of the Pentagon
WASHINGTON, (Portal) Topsecret military and intelligence documents that have surfaced online, with details ranging from Ukraine’s air defenses to Israel’s Mossad spy agency, have US officials trying to identify the source of the leak, with some Western security experts and US officials saying they suspected it might be someone from the United States.
Officials say the breadth of subjects covered in the documents, which cover the war in Ukraine, China, the Middle East and Africa, suggests they may have been leaked by an American rather than an ally.
“The focus now is that this is a US leak, as many of the documents were only in US hands,” Michael Mulroy, a former senior Pentagon official, told Portal in an interview.
US officials said the investigation was still in its early stages and those conducting it had not ruled out the possibility that proRussian elements were behind the leak, which has been viewed as one of the worst security breaches in more than 700,000 documents will Diplomatic Information, Telegrams appeared on the WikiLeaks website in 2013.
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The Russian Embassy in Washington and the Kremlin did not respond to requests for comment.
Following the leak, Portal reviewed more than 50 documents labeled “Secret” and “Top Secret” that first appeared on social media sites last month, starting with Discord and 4Chan. While some of the documents were released weeks ago, their existence was first reported by the New York Times on Friday.
Portal has not independently verified the authenticity of the documents. Some estimates of Ukrainian battlefield casualties appear to have been altered to minimize Russian casualties. It’s unclear why at least one is marked as unclassified, but it contains top secret information. Some documents are marked “NOFORN”, which means they cannot be issued to foreigners.
Two US officials told Portal on Sunday they did not rule out that the documents could have been tampered with to mislead investigators about their provenance or to spread false information that could harm US security interests.
The White House referred questions to the Pentagon.
In a statement Sunday, the Pentagon said it was reviewing the validity of the photographed documents, which “appear to contain sensitive and highly classified material.”
The Pentagon referred the matter to the Justice Department, which opened a criminal investigation.
One of the documents, dated February 23 and marked “Secret”, describes in detail how Ukraine’s S300 air defense systems would be exhausted by May 2 at the current rate of use.
Such closely guarded information could be of great use to Russian forces, and Ukraine said its president and top security officials met on Friday to discuss ways to prevent leaks.
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Another document, marked “Top Secret,” extracted from a March 1 CIA Intel update, says Mossad intelligence has encouraged protests against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plans to seize control of the colonel raise court.
The document states that the US discovered this through intelligence signals, suggesting that the US was spying on one of its key Middle East allies.
In a statement on Sunday, Netanyahu’s office called the claim “misleading and unfounded”.
Another document describes internal discussions between senior South Korean officials over US pressure on Seoul to help ship arms to Ukraine and its policy of not doing so.
A South Korean presidential official said Sunday the country is aware of the news of the leaked documents and plans to discuss “issues that have been raised” with Washington.
The Pentagon did not elaborate on the contents of any particular document, including the apparent surveillance by allies.
Two US officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that while there are concerns about the leak inside the Pentagon and intelligence agencies, the documents show a snapshot dating back more than a month and not more recent assessments.
The two officials said the military and intelligence agencies are reviewing their processes to see the extent to which information is shared internally.
Authorities are investigating what motives a US official or group of officials would have for disclosing such sensitive information, said one of the officials who spoke to Portal.
The official said investigators looked at four or five theories, ranging from a disgruntled employee to an insider threat actively seeking to undermine U.S. national security interests.
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