Ex-CIA on Ukraine: “Never has the United States leaked so much sensitive information so quickly”

Douglas London is a former CIA officer who worked for thirty-four years for its clandestine services, and author of the book The Recruiter: Spying and the Lost Art of American Intelligence (2021). It deciphers the unusual strategy of the United States to deliver a large amount of raw intelligence information to try to counter Putin.

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The competition between the great powers has become much more complicated since to the traditional instruments of power have been added cybernetics, technological warfare and the use of disinformation by Russia. The Russians are trying to take advantage of this new form of hybrid warfare to challenge us, taking advantage of the withdrawal of the United States from certain international arenas during the Trump years. We must counter them. So, yes, I think the United States’ strategy of disclosing sensitive information is effective and responds to a certain logic, provided that the consequences are properly assessed.

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It is unprecedented. The United States recently declassified intelligence information about the death of Jamal Kashoggi, Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election or Covid-19. But these were finished products, reviewed, sterilized, worked on for months, which make it possible to preserve sources and methods. In the case of Ukraine, we are witnessing the release of near-raw information, at unprecedented speed and volume. It’s unique.

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Yes. But not with the volume and speed we are currently witnessing. In December 1980, the USSR was about to invade Poland to suppress the Solidarnosc movement and the CIA had been informed of this by one of our agents, Polish Colonel Ryszard Jerzy Kuklinski, who revealed to us the plans of the Pact of Warsaw in case of conflict with NATO [entre 1972 et 1981, Kuklinski a fourni plus de 35 000 pages des documents secrets aux Américains, ndlr]. He provided us with the plan and timing that the USSR had in mind. So in an attempt to prevent the USSR from invading Poland, as it had done in Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968, the United States decided to make these plans public. This is to my knowledge the only historical example where the United States has leaked raw intelligence information. Like what we are doing today, with the same goal and the same opponent.

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In 2014, the United States and its allies were taken aback, not only by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but also by the misinformation campaign that accompanied it. But today, with 190,000 troops on the ground, there is no longer any element of surprise. What we’re trying to do is capture the narrative, unifying Western alliances, like NATO or the G7, to put as much pressure on Russia as possible. Ideally to prevent an invasion. You can’t embarrass Putin, he feels no shame. He is also trying to divide Westerners, to decouple the United States from Europeans. But by publicly exposing what it does, we facilitate our future countermeasures, for example in terms of sanctions. This weakens him and undermines his propaganda: he tries to solidify his position internally when he already has problems with Belarus, Kazakstan or Chechnya.

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The risks are significant. You don’t compromise potential sources without thinking about the consequences and weighing the risks against the rewards. Human sources are people we are obligated to protect, and you don’t get the same kind of context from a technical collection as you do from a person. Whatever precautions you take to mask, sterilize, disguise the source of your information, by revealing what you know, you also give the enemy the opportunity to identify weaknesses, strengthen defenses and put your own agents and collection abilities at risk. So you can have long-term consequences for short-term gain. But in this case, trying to prevent a war that can escalate horribly is a goal that justifies a reasonable risk.

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These lists respond to a certain logic. The Russians do not only fear the sanctions of the West, they seek preventively to prevent insurrections, by neutralizing Ukrainian political leaders, soldiers, members of Intelligence or even activists. They saw the Taliban’s method last year, when they took power in Afghanistan. The Taliban consolidated the borders and anticipated the capture of the country by carrying out a vast campaign of assassinations of judges, journalists, pilots, etc.

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I think he will try to go as far as possible while trying to limit the escalation. He is not stupid: he is aware of the consequences of an invasion, in terms of economic sanctions or human lives. He is testing the red lines. By recognizing the independence of two pro-Russian separatist provinces, he makes them, in fact, Russian annexes, but he claims that he only aims to support “pro-Russian partners” by sending the army there. This could be the start of a spiral.

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