Classified documents that seem to detail US national security secrets related to Ukraine, the Middle East and China have emerged online in what one intelligence official called a “nightmare” sequence of events.
The latest leak, revealed by the New York Times on Friday, comes on the heels of the Pentagon announcing earlier in the day that it is investigating photos that supposedly expose highly classified plans for a spring military offensive by Ukrainian forces.
The new batch of documents surfaced on the message board website 4chan, Twitter, Telegram and other websites Friday afternoon.
The new trove of material also includes secret briefing slides on China, the Indo-Pacific military theater, the Middle East and terrorism, the New York Times reported.
More material related to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine also appeared on social media sites Friday.
One new leaked document is a map that purports to show the status of fierce fighting currently underway in the eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut, according to the New York Times
The Post also discovered five new documents posted on the social media platform Telegram that reportedly shows Ukrainian air defense positions, combat equipment numbers and maps of the combat situations in Kharkiv and southern Ukraine.
A senior intelligence official told the New York Times that the leak is “a nightmare for the Five Eyes” — the United States, Britain, Australia, New Zealand and Canada, which share intelligence.
More than 100 documents have escaped the hands of the intelligence community, according to the report, which quotes an anonymous analyst describing the documents released this week as potentially the “tip of the iceberg.” (NYPost)