Leaked Pentagon papers claim the US using Ukraine for the proxy war

Washington D.C., Apr 11: A large cache of what appear to be classified Pentagon documents, military and intelligence, circulating on social media is becoming a growing source of anxiety for US intelligence agencies. The documents that have surfaced cover everything from US support for Ukraine's air defenses to Israel's Mossad spy agency and now US officials are scrambling to identify the leak's source.

 

 

 

The Pentagon said it was looking into the matter after social media posts of apparently classified documents on the war in Ukraine had emerged. “They look real,” a US official told CNN about the leaked documents. The New York Times first reported on the documents. On Friday, a further batch of more than 100 Pentagon documents was being shared on Twitter, seemingly revealing confidential information that US spy agencies had obtained. They appear to contain classified information on topics ranging from Russia and its war of aggression against Kyiv, Israel’s pathways to providing lethal aid to Ukraine, and South Korean concerns about providing ammunition to the US for use in Ukraine.

 

 

 

Officials told Reuters the breadth of topics addressed in the documents, which touch on the war in Ukraine, China, the Middle East, and Africa, suggest they may have been leaked by an American rather than an ally. Western security experts and US officials have said they suspected it could be someone from the United States. The officials are of the view that the classified documents came out in the public domain as a result of a leak but some of them may have been altered before they were posted, NBC news reported. The leaked documents show the mercenary outfit’s ambition to operate in African states as well as Haiti, and that it had hatched plans to source arms covertly from Nato member Turkey, The Guardian said in a report. One of the documents, dated February 23 and marked "Secret," outlines in detail how Ukraine's S-300 air defense systems would be depleted by May 2 at the current usage rate, Reuters reported. For instance, one of the slides says there have been 16,000-17,500 Russians killed in action, but US defense officials have publicly said that Russia has suffered over 200,000 casualties. Another document, marked "Top Secret" and from a CIA Intel update from March 1, says the Mossad intelligence agency was encouraging protests against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's plans to tighten controls on the Supreme Court. The document said the US learned this through signals intelligence, suggesting the United States had been spying on one of its most important allies in the Middle East, reported Reuters. Another document gave details of internal discussions among senior South Korean officials about US pressure on Seoul to help supply weapons to Ukraine, and its policy of not doing so. Government officials in South Korea, meanwhile, said they were aware that another leaked document suggested that US intelligence had spied on its allies in Seoul, and was planning to “have necessary consultations with the US side” over issues raised by the leak.

 

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The Department of Justice has opened an investigation into the leaks of a trove of apparent US intelligence documents that were posted on social media in recent weeks. The Pentagon said on Sunday it was reviewing the validity of the photographed documents that "appear to contain sensitive and highly classified material." "The focus now is on this being a US leak, as many of the documents were only in US hands," Michael Mulroy, a former senior Pentagon official, told Reuters in an interview. Seen as one of the most serious breaches, US officials said the investigation is in its early stages and those running it have not ruled out the possibility that pro-Russian elements were behind the leak.