‘Zero Dark Thirty’ leak investigators now target of leak probe

[Valin]

McClatchy DC:

Marisa Taylor and Jonathan S. Landay

12/20/13

 

WASHINGTON More than two years after sensitive information about the Osama bin Laden raid was disclosed to Hollywood filmmakers, Pentagon and CIA investigations havent publicly held anyone accountable despite internal findings that the leakers were former CIA Director Leon Panetta and the Defense Departments top intelligence official.

 

Instead, the Pentagon Inspector Generals Office is working to root out who might have disclosed the findings on Panetta and Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence Michael Vickers to a nonprofit watchdog group and to McClatchy.

While the information wasnt classified, the inspector generals office has pursued the new inquiry aggressively, grilling its own investigators, as well as the former director of its whistle-blowing unit, according to several people, including a congressional aide. They requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issues surrounding the 2012 movie Zero Dark Thirty.

 

Im concerned that the inspector generals office is barking up the wrong tree, said Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, who long has championed government whistle-blowing. Theres no doubt they should look into the Zero Dark Thirty fiasco, but they should focus on holding people accountable for leaking highly classified operational material instead of wasting time and money investigating who leaked the report.

The handling of the disclosures of protected information to the makers of Zero Dark Thirty, the award-winning account of the U.S. hunt for bin Laden, points up an apparent double standard in President Barack Obamas unprecedented crackdown on unauthorized leaks.

 

 

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