The United States is attempting to identify the source and has launched a criminal investigation into the leak of highly-classified documents that reveal sensitive details about U.S. allies, including Ukraine’s vulnerabilities in its war with Russia.
The Pentagon said on Sunday it had made a formal ‘referral’ to the Department of Justice (DOJ), asking it to investigate the apparent leak of the documents, which have been circulated on social media sites.
In a statement on Sunday, the Pentagon said it was reviewing the validity of the photographed documents that “appear to contain sensitive and highly classified material.”
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The leaks do not contain exact battle plans, but they present the first known breach of U.S. intelligence since the start of the Ukraine invasion, according to the Pentagon.
The documents were leaked on Twitter and Telegram and administration officials are not sure how they ended up online.
National Security Council spokesman John Kirby addressed the leak and the criminal investigation underway on Monday.
“Can you lay out what the consequences will be for the people or the person responsible for the leaks of these classified information? And secondly, have you been able to gauge what their motive is, just based on how they’ve released this information?” a reporter asked Kirby.
“The answer to both questions is, ‘No, I can’t.’ There’s a Justice Department investigation going on right now — a criminal investigation. I’m certainly not gonna say anything that would prejudice that, and that work is just starting. So we don’t know who’s behind this. We don’t know what the motive is, and I think, I can’t remember who asked before, but we don’t know what else might be out there,” Kirby said.
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He stressed the importance of not sharing the documents, of which he neither confirmed nor denied the legitimacy.
“Without confirming the validity of the documents, this is information that has no business in the public domain. It has no business, if you don’t mind me saying, on the pages of — front pages of newspapers, or on television. It is not intended for public consumption and it should not be out there,” Kirby stressed.
The leak appears to show Washington spying on close U.S. allies, including Ukraine, South Korea, and Israel, a potentially embarrassing revelation for the administration of U.S. President Joe Biden.
However, the documents appear to contain some errors, including battlefield casualty estimates that minimize Russian losses.
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“In order to protect this country every day the way we do, one of the things that we have to protect is information, not only the information itself, but the manner in which we glean that information,” Kirby added.
U.S. officials have told the Reuters news agency they have not ruled out the possibility the documents have been doctored to conceal their origin or spread false information that could damage US security interests.
The Ukrainian presidential office has said the leaked documents contain a large amount of “fictitious information” and bear the hallmarks of a Russian disinformation campaign.
One document marked “Secret” and dated February 23 describes how Ukraine’s air defense systems are on track to run out of munitions by May if they continue going through stockpiles at the current rate.
Another document claims that Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency encouraged protests against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s controversial judicial reforms, which Netanyahu’s office on Sunday said was “without any foundation whatsoever.”
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In another document, senior South Korean officials are said to have discussed coming under US pressure to help supply weapons to Ukraine in violation of Seoul’s policy against exporting weapons to countries in conflict.
On Sunday, a South Korean presidential official acknowledged the reports about the leaked documents and said it would raise the issue with Washington.
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