Warren P. Strobel,Missy Ryan and Hannah Natanson at WP:
The Yemen attack timeline that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth posted to a Signal chat group would have been so highly classified, under Pentagon guidelines, that the details should have been restricted to a special, compartmented channel with its own code word and with access tightly limited, according to former Defense Department officials.
Hegseth and other senior Trump administration officials have denied that the data they shared in a Signal group, which included the timing of weapons strikes against Yemen’s Houthis and intelligence information shared by Israel on the whereabouts of a top Houthi operative, was classified.
“These are indeed highly detailed operational plans for war,” said one of the former officials, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the issue’s sensitivity. “Twenty-five years, I have never known them not to be classified. And usually this operational level of detail is further restricted to those with a need-to-know.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who is facing scrutiny over his handling of details of a military strike, brought his wife, a former Fox News producer, to two meetings with foreign military counterparts where sensitive information was discussed, according to multiple people who were present or had knowledge of the discussions.
One of the meetings, a high-level discussion at the Pentagon on March 6 between Hegseth and U.K. Secretary of Defense John Healey, took place at a sensitive moment for the trans-Atlantic alliance, one day after the U.S. said it had cut off military intelligence sharing with Ukraine. The group that met at the Pentagon, which included Adm. Tony Radakin, the head of the U.K.’s armed forces, discussed the U.S. rationale behind that decision, as well as future military collaboration between the two allies, according to people familiar with the meeting.
A secretary can invite anyone to meetings with visiting counterparts, but attendee lists are usually carefully limited to those who need to be there and attendees are typically expected to possess security clearances given the delicate nature of the discussions, according to defense officials and people familiar with the meeting. There is often security near the meeting space to keep away uninvited attendees.
