Updated below (17:30 UTC)
When media reported on the first batch of 'leaked' Pentagon briefing slides they also published pictures of the originals.
Then came a second round which conveniently was more about bashing Russia than on the releases itself. Those leaks were labeled as new or from a previously unknown source. Among those stories were:
No Russia-Ukraine peace talks expected this year, U.S. leak shows – Washington Post, Apr 12, 2023
The grinding war between Ukraine and Russia is expected to bleed into 2024 with neither side securing victory yet both refusing to negotiate an end to the conflict, according to a Defense Intelligence Agency assessment that is among the highly sensitive U.S. government materials leaked online and obtained by The Washington Post.
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“Negotiations to end the conflict are unlikely during 2023 in all considered scenarios,” says the document, which has not been disclosed previously.
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A stalemate also will result in Ukraine enacting the “full mobilization” of its remaining eligible population, the document predicts, sending more young men to the front lines.
Leaked US intel: Russia operatives claimed new ties with UAE – Associated Press, Apr 12, 2023
U.S. spies caught Russian intelligence officers boasting that they had convinced the oil-rich United Arab Emirates “to work together against US and UK intelligence agencies,” according to a purported American document posted online as part of a major U.S. intelligence breach.
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The document viewed by the AP includes an item citing research from March 9 with the title: “Russia/UAE: Intelligence Relationship Deepening.” U.S. officials declined to confirm the document’s authenticity, which the AP could not independently do. However, it resembled other documents released as part of the recent leak.
The slides I have seen so far are from late February and the first days of March. A March 9 document is new.
New Leaked Documents Show Broad Infighting Among Russian Officials – New York Times, Apr 12, 2023
The additional documents, which did not surface in a 53-page set that came to wide public attention online last week, paint a picture of the Russian government feuding over the count of the dead and wounded in the Ukraine war, with the domestic intelligence agency accusing the military of obscuring the scale of casualties that Russia has suffered.
The new batch, which contains 27 pages, reinforces how deeply American spy agencies have penetrated nearly every aspect of the Russian intelligence apparatus and military command structure.
(The piece is bylined by Bellingcat's Aric Toler.) There is no explanation where the "additional documents" are coming from or how they were found.
US thinks UN chief too accommodating to Moscow, leaked files suggest – BBC, Apr 13, 2023
The US believes the UN secretary general is too willing to accommodate Russian interests, according to fresh revelations in classified documents leaked online.
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It is the latest from a leak of secret documents, which US officials are scrambling to get to the bottom of.
I am also curious about the selective reporting of a second stash of documents by mainstream media.
This looks to me like someone is now piecemeal feeding additional 'intelligence' to the various outlets. Each runs a different stories. If this is from a common stash how come that these outlets seem to have coordinated who is taking on what briefing slide?
No pictures of the underlying briefing slides has appeared in this second round of 'leaks'.
Now the Washington Post claims to have lots of information about the person that 'leaked' the first stash of the Pentagon briefing slides:
The man behind a massive leak of U.S. government secrets that has exposed spying on allies, revealed the grim prospects for Ukraine’s war with Russia and ignited diplomatic fires for the White House is a young, charismatic gun enthusiast who shared highly classified documents with a group of far-flung acquaintances searching for companionship amid the isolation of the pandemic.
United by their mutual love of guns, military gear and God, the group of roughly two dozen — mostly men and boys — formed an invitation-only clubhouse in 2020 on Discord, an online platform popular with gamers. But they paid little attention last year when the man some call “OG” posted a message laden with strange acronyms and jargon. The words were unfamiliar, and few people read the long note, one of the members explained. But he revered OG, the elder leader of their tiny tribe, who claimed to know secrets that the government withheld from ordinary people.
The young member read OG’s message closely, and the hundreds more that he said followed on a regular basis for months.
I am skeptical of that way too neat story. Is this "mutual love of guns, military gear and God" for real?
The tale does not really explain how the 'reporters', the Post's intelligence and national security scribe Shane Harris and Samuel Oakford of Bellingcat fame, found the person or why it was willing to completely spill its beans:
This account of how detailed intelligence documents intended for an exclusive circle of military leaders and government decision-makers found their way into and then out of OG’s closed community is based in part on several lengthy interviews with the Discord group member, who spoke to The Washington Post on the condition of anonymity. He is under 18 and was a young teenager when he met OG. The Post obtained consent from the member’s mother to speak to him and to record his remarks on video. He asked that his voice not be obscured.
His account was corroborated by a second member who read many of the same classified documents shared by OG, and who also spoke on the condition of anonymity. Both members said they know OG’s real name as well as the state where he lives and works but declined to share that information while the FBI is hunting for the source of the leaks.
One does not use real names when joining a gamers talk server or similar venues. So even if the Post had that member's online 'name' there would usually be no way to find it.
Did the teen gamer contact the Post? But why would s/he talk at all about the issue?
And why would the Post publish so many details about the person? This will evidently make it easy for the FBI to identify her or him.
The Post also claims that the stash is much bigger than previously known:
The Post also reviewed approximately 300 photos of classified documents, most of which have not been made public; some of the text documents OG is said to have written out; an audio recording of a man the two group members identified as OG speaking to his companions; and chat records and photographs that show OG communicating with them on the Discord server.
But the Post does not say where those 300+ documents come from or what they are about. Are they not the more important story?
We have pictures of the first stash of the files. The briefing slides seem real to me. The language is correct Pentagon lingo. The abbreviations used are typical. But some of the information therein, like the casualty numbers, is dubious. Do the Joint Chiefs of Staff really get briefed with Ukrainian defense ministry numbers that are know to be mere fantasies? The Pentagon and/or the CIA certainly have their own casualty estimates. Why not brief those?
We have seen no picture of any slide that the additional stories are based on. Why were those not published?
A plausible explanation is that the first release was a real leak but that someone is now pushing new 'leaks' to dedicated outlets that are only half true or mere propaganda.
On top of that the Washington Post story about 'OG' is not only weird but suspicious.
At Naked Capitalism Lambert Strether and Yves Smith also have doubts about it:
Yves and I discussed this piece; it seems to us remarkably “shiny”; perhaps written, from clues in tone and structure, by an entity other than the bylined “reporter.” The central character in the excessively tight narrative, “OG,” the leaker, is putatively a Christian, a gun enthusiast, and something akin to a cult leader of a group of disaffected teenagers on the Discord server where the documents were found; his motive in placing the documents there seems to have been to consolidate his authority and moral ascendancy over his group. Meanwhile, “OG” seems almost perfectly calculated to fit neatly into the “fascist traitor” hole in liberal heads. I wonder if we’ll ever find him? One can see “The Hunt for OG” storyline persisting for many weeks, good job. […] As far as cui bono, Yves points out that obvious next steps are to pass the pernicious Restrict Act and exert authority over yet another platform, Discord.
Or is all of this a diversion from the Ukrainian loss of Bakhmut?
Or was all this leaked as a warning to the White House by someone high up in the security state?
Seymour Hersh's latest about Zelensky's corruption may give a clue. A summary of the paywalled Hersh piece says:
Meanwhile, Hersh, citing an intelligence official, said that the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines and lack of strategic planning with regard to Ukraine had caused a growing rift between the White House and the US intelligence community.
“There is a total breakdown between the White House leadership and the intelligence community,” the intelligence official was quoted by Hersh as saying.
The alleged rift dates back to the covert operation last fall to blow up Russia’s Nord Stream pipelines, a move that was purportedly ordered by President Joe Biden.
“Destroying the Nord Stream pipelines was never discussed, or even known in advance, by the community,” the official said.
Another issue dividing the Biden administration and the intelligence community is the lack of planning on Ukraine. The official highlighted Biden’s decision to deploy two brigades a few miles from the Ukrainian border in response to Russia’s special military operation.
If there is some bad blood between the military or intelligence community and the White House the whole 'leak' story may well have been placed to limit the White House's option.
Update (17:30 UTC)
The New York Times has found the 'leaker' and published his name and whereabouts.
Leader of Online Group Where Secret Documents Leaked Is Air National Guardsman
The leader of a small online gaming chat group where a trove of classified U.S. intelligence documents leaked over the last few months is a 21-year-old member of the intelligence wing of the Massachusetts Air National Guard, according to interviews and documents reviewed by The New York Times.
The national guardsman, whose name is Jack Teixeira, oversaw a private online group named Thug Shaker Central, where about 20 to 30 people, mostly young men and teenagers, came together over a shared love of guns, racist online memes and video games.
The lead writer byline starts with Erin Toller of Bellingcat fame, another byline is of Christiaan Triebert, formerly Bellingcat. It was Triebert who who tweeted out the NYT story:
Christiaan Triebert @trbrtc – 16:02 UTC · Apr 13, 2023
We've identified the leader of the Discord group where top secret U.S. documents were leaked — it's a 21-year-old member of the Massachusetts Air National Guard, specifically its intelligence wing. Gift link, no paywall:
Here’s what we know about the leader of the online group where secret documents were leaked.
One writer byline of a Washington Post piece above was Samuel Oakford likewise a former Bellingcat writer.
We know that Bellingcat is an outlet for the British external intelligence service MI6. This thereby looks very fishy:
chinahand @chinahand – 17:11 UTC · Apr 13, 2023
if bellingcat id'd the leaker wonder if gchq fed some breadcrumbs so nsa could continue to maintain "we don't surveil US citizens w/o a warrant". there's a whole 5 eyes tagteam built around dodging national restrictions on surveillance, i think
I for one find it extremely concerning that the Washington Post and the New York Times worked more intensely on identifying the source of the leaks that the leaked briefing slides. Since when is it their job to find people who endanger the national security state?
/End Update/