Gross Incompetence

Jesus H. Christ.

The al-Qaida suspect named by U.S. officials as the source of information that led to this week’s terrorist alerts was working undercover, Pakistani intelligence sources said Friday, putting an end to the sting operation and forcing Pakistan to hide the man in a secret location. [...] A Pakistani intelligence source told Reuters on Friday that Khan, who was arrested in Lahore secretly last month, had been actively cooperating with intelligence agents to help catch al-Qaida operatives when his name appeared in U.S. newspapers.

This really is a f***up of the first order. Absolutely unbelievable. The real question, though, is who leaked this originally? The confirmation of Khan as the source of the 3-year-old intelligence leading to the security upgrades in New York came in response to a NY Times article on Monday. So where did the Times reporters get the name? Unless a third party exists that I can't think of, it came either from a U.S. official or from a Pakistani official. If it came from a U.S. official, somebody should be facing criminal charges and the administration that hired them should be considered unfit to prosecute this war.

Note the typical Friday evening release time for damaging news. This is an entirely more serious breach than Valerie Plame, regardless of the motives involved in either.