Welcome to Friday! Big news:
VESPERS! Wednesday, April 26, noon Eastern Time (6pm Central Europe, 4pm GMT)
We will be joined by a SPECIAL GUEST who will talk about what it’s like to be a target of a Russian disinformation campaign.
Vespers are a super fun opportunity to chat in a relaxed environment about influence operations, current events, and killer animals. But you have to be a paid subscriber, so smash that button and come join us! You also get access to my Foreign Influence Operations course. Class 7: Case Studies is coming out on Monday! The course is designed to do at your own pace, so it’s never too late to sign up. Check it out!
I am also now on Substack Notes. Honestly, it’s a little exhausting keeping up with so many platforms, but I’m doing my best.
ALEX’S WEEKLY RANT
A number of people have asked me my thoughts on the US intelligence documents leak and the arrest of Massachusetts National Air Guardsman Jack Teixeira, who allegedly stole the top secret documents and posted them online to impress his gaming friends. My first response is:
I gave a fuller response to Just Security:
For me, the biggest takeaway is that the government needs to revisit its clearance process and stop handing out Top Secret access like it is candy at Halloween. Getting a clearance has become a bureaucratic process, rather than a common sense process. Issues such as Teixeira’s anti-government views are not likely to manifest themselves on a form, and too many people hold high-level clearances. Lastly, we need to rethink sharing. After 9/11, sharing intelligence widely became a mantra, and rightly so. But perhaps some sharing needs to be reined in.
(You can read the entire article, which has insights from people way smarter than me, here.)
All that said, we need to maintain some perspective. This is not on the level of Aldrich Ames, Harold Nicholson, or Robert Hanssen (who handed the Russians intelligence on our sources) or on the level of Edward Snowden (who handed the world intelligence on our methods and by pure chance ended up in Moscow with Russian citizenship—probably just a coincidence!).
But the Teixeira case does still have a number of unanswered questions, the answers to which could change my assessment. Indeed, an interesting theory has been floating around, wondering if Teixeira was targeted and manipulated into posting top secret intel. A number of people in his online Discord group are from other countries, including Russia, meaning Teixeira handed classified docs to Russian citizens.
Then there is this totally whacked story: a woman posing online as Russian propagandist Donbass Devushka (which means Donbass Girl) is, in real life, a former US Navy Chief Petty Officer who lives in New Jersey. The woman, whose real name is Sarah Bils, disseminated some of Teixeira’s stolen documents. In fact, she appears to be the first to have disseminated doctored versions of the documents, in order to make it look like Russia was suffering fewer casualties than it really was.
So, not only will Donbass Devushka’s online fans be disappointed she’s not actually some Russian hottie but rather a chick from New Jersey who probably grew up with permed hair and knows every Jon Bon Jovi lyric ever, but we now also have another member of the US military out there doing pro-Russia shit. (Yes, she is now out of the Navy, but her Russian alter-ego has existed since 2014). To repeat:
And now, let’s make matters worse.
This week, Dominion Voting Systems settled its defamation case with Fox News for $787.5 million. That sounds like a lot to normal people like you and me, but honestly, for Rupert, it’s not much. People are already calculating how much Fox will save in taxes because of the settlement.
If you recall, I wrote the following in a Rant! back in March:
But here’s the thing: Dominion can bring a lawsuit for damage to the company. But the damage of these lies goes far beyond Dominion.
Fox’s lies helped feed an insurrection on the Capitol and contributed enormously to the polarization of public discourse and our inability to agree on basic facts. Rule of law is essential to democracy, and rule of law requires agreed-upon facts. Democracy also requires the public’s faith in the system, faith that their vote counts. In helping to create a false reality for half the country, Fox News helped undermine faith in that system. Those lies are damaging our democracy, yet, unlike Dominion, We the People have no recourse against Fox.
We still have no recourse. The settlement does not force Fox to admit it lied. In fact, Fox released a statement about the settlement with this laughable phrase: “This settlement reflects Fox's continued commitment to the highest journalistic standards.”
And what high journalistic standards they are! Just days before this settlement, guess what Tucker Carlson was up to? He was sharing the Donbass Devushka’s doctored documents, which exaggerated Ukraine’s casualties and downplayed Russian losses. That is, he was sharing Russian propaganda.
But don’t worry. Fox has totally learned its lesson.
THE WEEK’S LINKS
A roundup of stories you should be reading
(Note: I reserve the right to rant in depth about any of these at a future date)
RUSSIA
Russian spy network operating in North Sea, investigation claims (The Guardian)
CHINA
DOJ charges 2 with allegedly running secret Chinese police station in US (Axios)
China ‘greatest threat’ to Dutch economic security, Dutch intelligence says (Reuters)
AMERICA LOSING ITS MIND
FBI investigating GOP Oklahoma officials caught on tape talking about lynching Black people, murdering newspaper reporters (Heartland Signal)
US INTELLIGENCE LEAKS
Air Force base in document leaks case loses intel mission (Air Force Times)
YOUR FEEL-GOOD STORY OF THE WEEK
Cristiano Ronaldo appears to make obscene gesture in response to Lionel Messi chant (Daily Mail)
Alex Finley is a former officer of the CIA’s Directorate of Operations, where she served in West Africa and Europe. She writes and teaches about terrorism, disinformation / covert influence, and oligarch yachts. Her writing has appeared in Slate, Reductress, Funny or Die, POLITICO, The Center for Public Integrity, and other publications. She has spoken to the BBC, MSNBC, CNN, C-SPAN’s Washington Journal, France24, and numerous other media outlets. She was also invited once to speak at Harvard, which she now tells everyone within the first ten seconds of meeting them. She is the author of the Victor Caro series, satirical novels about the CIA. Before joining the CIA, Alex was a journalist, covering Capitol Hill, the Pentagon, and the Department of Energy. She reported on issues related to national security, intelligence, and homeland security. Did she mention she was invited to speak at Harvard?