Britain’s Home Secretary is “irritated” that U.S. intelligence officials leaked “confidential” information about the Manchester terror attack to American media, allowing them to reveal key details before U.K. media were cleared to do so. The attacker’s name, the high death toll, and the fact that it was a suicide bombing were among the facts finding their way to CBS and NBC before being disclosed to local outlets.
Amber Rudd said US conduct had been “irritating” and said she had made clear to her American counterparts that such leaks “shouldn’t happen again”.
The episode comes just a week after US president Donald Trump defended his right to leak classified intelligence to other countries’ leaders. Mr Trump has also criticised leaking from the US intelligence establishment.
Asked on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme about the US leaks, Ms Rudd said: “The British police have been very clear that they want to control the flow of information in order to protect operational integrity, the element of surprise.
“So it is irritating when it gets released from other sources and I have been very clear with our friends that that should not happen again.”
There are so many interesting prongs here: echelons of the U.S. security apparatus that don’t care about intelligence partners, sources in the White House and elsewhere leaking whatever they get their hands on, the futility of trying to manage what the media knows in the presence of all this, the presumed inability of America’s intelligence partners (such as the UK) to extricate themselves…