This Week In Babylon: Legacy Media Amplifies Pentagon Leak While Doxxing Whistleblower.
On this week's episode of 'To Catch a Whistleblower," the New York Times applauds itself for publishing an article identifying leaker Jack Teixeira hours before a SWAT team arrested him.
Earlier this month, classified documents from the Pentagon leaked, causing journalists in the legacy media to emulate characters from a true crime Netflix drama in a “hunt” to uncover the leaker's identity. Classified documents, including details about Ukrainian military supplies and intelligence gathered on allied and non-allied nations, leaked on social media. Shortly after the documents were posted on a small social media channel on Telegram called Donbass Devushka, The New York Times and other media outlets reported on the leak.
Throughout the course of the investigation led by journalists in a captivating chase to help law enforcement arrest a whistleblower exposing government lies, it was determined the leaks were circulating the internet at least several weeks before American media broke the story on April 6th. Small Discord servers Thug Shaker Central and WowMao circulated documents tied to the leak weeks, if not months, before the documents were posted by Donbass Devushka on April 5th. USAF National Guardsman Jack Teixeira was arrested in connection with the leak. He was detained just hours after New York Times journalists identified him as the source of the leak.
The documents, if authentic, confirm US officials have lied publicly about various aspects of the Ukraine conflict while targeting allied and non-allied nations in widespread intelligence-gathering operations. Meanwhile, members of Congress are pushing RESTRICT Act by using national security as justification to restrict constitutional rights.
Below is a timeline of the Pentagon document leak, which is sourced and in chronological order.
Timeline of the Pentagon Leak
On March 1st and 2nd, 30 documents were leaked on a discord server called WowMao (Bellingcat).
“Bellingcat spoke to members of a separate Discord community who claimed that other images had been posted earlier on yet another, since deleted, server often called “Thug Shaker Central” but which also had several other names at different times. Image files shown to Bellingcat detailed a further document in the same style and formatting of those posted in the WowMao server that was dated to January 13. "
On March 5th, 10 leaked documents appear on a small Discord server called “Minecraft Earth Map.” Bellingcat reported that “all seven of the documents from the 4chan and Telegram posts [which were posted on April 5th, 2023] – including the map with the lower casualty figures from Ukraine – were present in this post, along with three additional ones not posted in any Telegram, Twitter, or 4chan post at the time.
On April 5th, a small social media channel named Donbass Devushka posted five images purporting to be leaked classified documents. The channel deleted the post. The channel has fewer than 70,000 followers on Telegram and Twitter, respectively. Conversely, the New York Times and Washington Post have nearly 75 million combined followers on Twitter.
On April 6th, The New York Times reports on the leaked Pentagon documents. Key points of the article:
“Military analysts said the documents appear to have been modified in certain parts from their original format, overstating American estimates of Ukrainian war dead and understating estimates of Russian troops killed.”
“One of the slides said 16,000 to 17,500 Russian soldiers had been killed while Ukraine had suffered as many as 71,500 troop deaths. The Pentagon and other analysts have estimated that Russia has suffered far more casualties, and that closer to 200,000 soldiers on each side had been killed or wounded.”
Politico reported on March 17th, 2023 that US officials estimated Ukraine lost “over 100,000” soldiers “in the year-long war:”
“The document contains a summary of 12 combat brigades that are being assembled, with nine of them apparently being trained and supplied by the United States and other NATO allies. Of those nine brigades, the documents said that six would be ready by March 31 and the rest by April 30. A Ukrainian brigade has about 4,000 to 5,000 soldiers, analysts said.”
“Another document includes columns that list Ukrainian troop units, equipment and training, with schedules for January through April. The document contains a summary of 12 combat brigades that are being assembled, with nine of them apparently being trained and supplied by the United States and other NATO allies. Of those nine brigades, the documents said that six would be ready by March 31 and the rest by April 30. A Ukrainian brigade has about 4,000 to 5,000 soldiers, analysts said.”
“As recently as last summer, American intelligence officials said they often had a better understanding of Russia’s military plans than of Ukraine’s.”
On April 9th, Wall Street Journal reports that leaked Pentagon documents reveal Ukraine could run out of S-300 air defense missiles within weeks
On April 9th, Bellingcat writes a story about how images of leaked classified Pentagon and US government documents ended up on Discord, 4chan, and Telegram. In the article, Bellingcat asserts that the images surfaced on Discord, and then, weeks later, were posted on 4chan. Several hours after the images were posted on 4chan, a small Telegram channel called Donbass Devushka shared images that were posted to 4chan. Donbass Devushka’s channel claims the pictures were messaged to one of the fifteen administrators of the Donbass Devushka Telegram channel.
Bellingcat claims one of the five images posted by Donbass Devushka was altered to increase Ukrainian KIA was posted on 4chan before it was posted on Donbass Devushka’s Telegram channel.
Bellingcat believes an image was forged or altered to inflate the killed-in-action number for Ukraine and decrease the killed-in-action numbers for Russia. The evidence to support this claim is the resolution and spacing of the image Bellingcat claims is altered. Bellingcat did not authenticate the documents.
The claim that the death toll for Ukraine and Russia was altered was repeated by multiple legacy media outlets, including ABC, New York Times, and The Washington Post. However, none of the outlets authenticated the documents, and claims of alterations are therefore speculative at best.
Bellingcat spoke to 3 members of the small, invite-only Discord channel (which media outlets allege included 20-30 active members). These members claimed documents were leaked on the Discord channel “months” before The New York Times first reported on the Pentagon leak in early April.
On April 10th, The Washington Post published a detailed article covering the contents of the alleged leaked document. The leak included information that was damaging to Russian allies, such as claims that:
The US had access to private discussions among Iranian officials, which implies the US has a human intelligence source within the administration or is intercepting communications
China considered strikes within the borders of Russia with NATO weapons as a “red-line” issue that would bring China directly into the Ukraine conflict. The US has publicly warned China not to support Russia regarding the Ukrainian conflict. The leaked information involving China serves to connect China with “hostile” Russia while neo-cons and China war-hawks attempt to use the Chinese TikTok app as justification for massive censorship in a “digital version of the Patriot Act.”
“A “CIA Operations Center Intelligence Update” included in the leaks said that Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban identified the United States as one of his party’s “top three adversaries” during a political strategy session on Feb. 22.” This suggests US intelligence has a human source close to Prime Minister Orban or is intercepting communications. On April 14th, The Guardian released a story about US lawmakers targeting Hungarians due, writing:
“Orbán is seen by his critics as Vladimir Putin’s closest ally in the EU. His government’s blocking of Sweden’s Nato accession has further soured the relationship with Washington and, until the end of March, Budapest had been delaying Finland’s bid to join, too. Hungary has also blocked Ukrainian participation in several high-level Nato meetings since 2017.”
“This week, leaked Pentagon documents, based on intelligence, reported that the Hungarian prime minister had described the US as one of his party’s top three adversaries.
“The treasury department had also announced punitive measures against the former IIB board chair, Nikolay Kosov, and two senior management officials, Georgy Potapov and Imre Laszlóczki.”
“A day earlier, the US ambassador, David Pressman, said that, unlike other Nato allies, the Hungarian government had ignored US warnings about the bank’s activities. “Hungary has dismissed the concerns of the United States government regarding the risks its continued presence poses to the alliance,” Pressman said. “We have concerns about the continued eagerness of Hungarian leaders to expand and deepen ties with the Russian Federation.”
Other details shared by the Washington Post about the leaks involved the US monitoring internal discussions among South Korean officials and intelligence suggesting the Mossad supported recent anti-government protests in Israel
Also on April 10th, the New York Times released a detailed story about hunting down the leaker of the Pentagon documents:
On April 11th, Glenn Greenwald discussed the Pentagon document leaks, pointing out the concerning role journalists played in “hunting down” the whistleblower:
On April 12th, the New York Post reports that 14 American special forces members may be operating in Ukraine:
On April 13th, the New York Times published their story about the identity of the leaker. Shortly after the story was published, a SWAT team raided the suspected leaker’s residence.
On April 13th, Col. MacGregor discussed the Pentagon document leak, pointing out oddities in the narrative:
On April 13th, Democracy Now discussed how the leak shows the US is spying on allies:
On April 14th, The Washington Post shared a video interview with an individual who claimed to belong to a Discord server called Thug Shaker Central that posted classified documents:
On April 16th, The New York Times discusses how they assisted in the identification and arrest of the Pentagon document leaker:
On April 17th, The Wall Street Journal runs a front-page story doxxing an American female veteran who is one of fifteen administrators for Donbass Devushka social media channels:
On April 16th, Newsweek published an in-depth report of the leak after obtaining more than four dozen documents. Newsweek cites the affidavit in support of Jack Teixeira's arrest to clarify that the leaked documents are public domain since they were posted on gaming servers as early as January of this year.
Major findings from the Newsweek article:
“U.S. intelligence is meticulously following the fighting around Bakhmut, mapping Russian troops down to individual trenches and tracking every electronic squawk, from individual cell phones to radars. The soda-straw view shows Bakhmut slowly falling into Russian hands. Its loss will be a psychological blow, but the town is not vital to the overall war, and the United States and its allies are looking to the future, busy building up Ukraine for the Spring "counteroffensive" that the documents say is slated to begin at the end of April.”
One “document reports on a February 28 order from chairman of the Ukrainian Main Intelligence Directorate Kyrylo Budanov to deploy the elite "Kraken" unit to Bakhmut to stabilize a "catastrophic" situation. Ukrainian morale in Bakhmut is assessed as low.
“U.S. intelligence concludes that as many as 43,000 Russian soldiers have been killed and 180,000 have been wounded since February 2022. That's more than the entire size of the initial invading force. The war has also been costly for Ukraine; its losses are as high as 131,000 killed and wounded.” Newsweek does not explain how Russia was able to hold Ukrianian territory if its entire invading force was killed or injured. The estimates of killed in action for Russia and Ukriane would equate to Ukraine losing more than 3 soldiers for every Russian soldier killed.
The high level of classification of the documents means “unauthorized disclosure could compromise intelligence "sources and methods.”
One document “reports a Ukrainian sabotage operation in Belarus, where Ukrainian agents evidently ‘violated orders’ and attacked a Russian airborne early warning airplane on the ground with a small drone.”
Another “document reveals that the U.S. has at least 100 personnel in Ukraine, suggesting that there are 100 in the embassy and attending to diplomatic and aid questions, with another 14 special operators in country, out of a total of 97 such commandos, half of whom are British.”
One “document contains reference to never-before-revealed "Phoenix Strike" training that is taking place in France, Germany, and the Netherlands for Ukrainian special forces.”
A “high-fidelity snapshot of Russian and Ukrainian forces, based on "emitter activity," that is, intercepts of electronic signals—mostly radios and radars…The document shows the degree to which the National Security Agency (NSA) and its military affiliates collect "traffic" data: electronic intelligence (ELINT) other than voice communications.
A “snapshot of the battlefield in the south, from Kherson on the western edge to north of Mariupol in the east. A significant number of military personnel still face off here, approximately 23,250 Russians and some 4,000-8,000 Ukraine soldiers. Concentrations of emitter data (similar to other documents) locate Russian equipment and unit concentrations.”
“We have low confidence in Russian (RUS) and Ukrainian (UKR) attrition rates and inventories because of information gaps," the document says, not only questioning Russia's numbers but also "potential bias in UKR [Ukraine] information sharing. More detailed than the data in Documents #1 and #2, the estimates are sobering: 189,500-223,000 Russians killed or injured in combat; and 124,500-131,000 Ukrainians killed or injured. For Russia, that's twice as many soldiers and mercenaries than were present at the start of the conflict in February 2022.” Russia's invading force was reported to be up to 190,000 soliders, meaning 189,500-223,000 Russian killed or injured does not equate to Russia losing “twice as many soldiers than were present at the start of the conflict.”
Newsweek states one document confirms plans for a Ukrianian offensive on April 30th: “the document indicates the degree to which deliveries are culminating in a "Spring offensive" that is planned for April 30, 2023. The nine combat brigades will experience significant increase in combat power before then. "Total equipment required for (9) BDEs is 253 x Tanks, 381 x Mech[anized vehicles], 480 x Motor[ized] vehicles, and 147 x Artillery plus delivery of 571 x U.S. up-armored HMMWVs," the document states.”
“The offensive will be undertaken by Ukraine's 10th Operational Corps and by made up of the nine brigades that are being reequipped by U.S. and allied forces, with three additional brigades "fully sourced by Ukraine," that is, equipped through reconstitution and cannibalization.”
On April 17th, The Donbass Devushka Twitter account released a statement in response to articles by the Wall Street Journal, Bellingcat, and Newsweek that doxxed one of the channel’s administrators. The channel claims the documents were messaged to a channel administrator:
On April 17th, Breaking Points discussed the Wall Street Journal doxxing an administrator for the Donbass Devushka channel: