The fact that no one on the chat raised any concern about discussing classified matters on a commercial app strongly suggests such behavior may be common practice in this administration, as recent reporting indicates. This is particularly egregious, given how many participants have had direct responsibility for protecting classified information during their careers. Secretary of State Marco Rubio was vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. The C.I.A. director, John Ratcliffe, was the director of national intelligence. Tulsi Gabbard, who is the current national intelligence chief, Mr. Waltz and Mr. Hegseth are former military officers. They all know better.
After getting caught, they defended the use of Signal for such purposes. Attorney General Pam Bondi told Fox News that Signal is a “very safe way to communicate,” adding, “I don’t think foreign adversaries are able to hack Signal, as far as I know.” Mr. Ratcliffe called Signal “an appropriate channel to communicate sensitive information.” Such statements indicate that the Trump team could continue to hand U.S. secrets on a silver platter to Russia, China, Iran and North Korea.
For decades, administrations have followed well-established processes for national security decision-making. Take the example of conducting strikes against a foreign adversary. Such a matter should be the subject of a series of meetings first with deputies and then cabinet members conducted in the secure confines of the White House Situation Room. All the relevant players should participate, including the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the regional combatant commander, neither of whom was included in the Signal chat. Every principal has 24/7 access to secure communications if they can’t join in person.
These meetings would be organized around an agenda circulated in advance, a detailed options paper, a military concept of operations, a diplomatic strategy and a communications plan. The deliberations should weigh the policy options, the risks and benefits of the proposed military action, as well as the regional and global diplomatic, economic and security implications. The principals should ensure that adequate precautions have been taken to defend American personnel and our partners in the Middle East from potential retaliatory action. All this should be considered in advance of the principals making a recommendation to the president, preferably in a National Security Council meeting chaired by the president in the White House Situation Room. If the vice president wished to reopen the issue, as Mr. Vance did in the chat, the national security adviser should have reconvened an in-person meeting for further secure deliberations. All such meetings are documented in written summaries for the agencies and the N.S.C., which are preserved, as required by law, as presidential records.
Once a decision is taken by the president to conduct a military operation, the timing, launch and effects of the operation should be communicated by the Defense Department to the White House and other agencies in a highly secure setting. Recall the famous photo of President Obama’s national security team squeezed into a small room where they received real-time updates during the operation to kill Osama Bin Laden? That’s how those who need to know are kept informed — and our adversaries are not.
