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At Pentagon, Effort to Stop Leaks to Media

Aired July 16, 2002 - 14:12   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: A bit of irony today from the Pentagon. An effort to stop leaks to the media has come to light, and we're learning about it from, yes, you guessed it: from a memo that was leaked to us.

CNN Pentagon correspondent Barbara Starr joins us now with the details on this.

Barbara, I hope they're not getting upset with you.

BARBARA STARR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Not yet, Kyra.

In fact, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is now officially on the warpath against Pentagon personnel who are leaking classified information to the news media. He is telling them once again it's wrong, it's against the law, he says, and it has to stop.

Now all of this has come to light because the secretary of defense has issued a memo to all senior staff, reminding them that this practice must stop. And to make his case this time, he has a report from the Central Intelligence Agency, an assessment of what classified leagues are doing to national security, and as you said, all of this has been leaked to the news media here in Washington.

The CIA report is very specific. It says: that information obtained from captured detainees -- those detainees at Guantanamo Bay -- has revealed that Al Qaeda operatives are extremely security conscious and have altered their practices in response to what they have learned from the press about our capabilities.

And the CIA portion of the memo goes on and says, that "Disclosure of classified information -- quoting again -- "has jeopardized highly fragile and very sensitive intelligence capabilities that the U.S. requires, or the successful prosecution of the war against terrorism.

In fact, what the CIA has concluded is that Al Qaeda planners have now learned a great deal about U.S. counterintelligence capabilities from reading newspapers, watching television, listening to the radio, and using the Internet.

Now all of this has come to light after a series of annoying, if not highly sensitive, leaks from, in fact, Pentagon officials to the news media. Of course, the one that got the most attention recently was one to the "New York Times." They got a quite interestingly leak about U.S. plans, U.S. Military plans for some possible operation against Iraq. That didn't please the secretary of defense at all.

So he's reminding everyone today in a memo and in CIA report that is now being circulated, leaking is against the law -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: Barbara, I have to ask you, when you do get a piece of information from a source or say something is leaked. What's the process you go through there at the Pentagon. How do you decide, OK, we are going to go with this or not?

STARR: Well, I have to tell you that it's very -- I think any reporter for CNN or any news organization will tell you that it's very case specific. Every news organization gets information that clearly is a national security risk, and they don't report.

And I guess I would quote my own colleague John King at the White House. He recently noted on the air that the news media the reporters that cover the White House, because they are there every day, they see an awful lot about the very sensitive security, for example, surrounding President Bush. The Secret Service security he gets, the new security measures around the White House. The news media has been asked by the Secret Service not to report that. That would be a jeopardy to the president and to the White House staff and the White House complex, and as John King says, of course the news media doesn't want to do that and doesn't report some of those excruciating details about national security.

Likewise we don't report some of the things that we may learn about ongoing military operations that might put soldiers at risk at that specific point in time. News organizations take a very hard look at this, almost on a daily basis, when there's sensitive material at hand.

PHILLIPS: Points well made, Our Barbara Starr live from the Pentagon. Thanks, Barbara.

STARR: Thank you.

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