How on earth could a journalist know what, time, what weapons and where the U.S. Government would strike the Houthi rebels?

This warrants a thorough investigation and cannot happen again.

This error could have cost the lives of American military personnel, not to mention jeopardised the efficacy of the mission.

The plan was to inflict military damage on Houthi rebels in Yemen, the details of which were shared with top Government members on an open-source messaging app called “ Signal”. This app comes preloaded on Government phones and should never be used to divulge such important information.

Signal is an end-to-end encrypted platform. 

National Security Adviser Mike Waltz inadvertently sent all the plans to the Editor-In-Chief of The Atlantic, Jeffery Goldberg who in turn wrote a fulsome article entitled” The Trump Administration Accidentally Texted Me Its War Plans.”

Should  Goldberg have reached out to top Government officials and pointed out this mistake and left it at that rather than rush to print? That would have been the prudent thing to do.

It was an embarrassing slip-up, a situation that ordinarily would see heads roll.

Mike Waltz accepted full responsibility for the Signal chat leak, but President Donald Trump did not throw him to the wolves.

The Trump administration turned on Goldberg, called into question his credibility and maintained that the information was not classified. What it should have done is put its hands up in the air, acknowledge this was an egregious error and asked Goldberg not to divulge the contents of the conversation thread.

No doubt miffed and vexed, Goldberg took to The Atlantic, revealing the full transcript of the leaked information and asked the readership to judge for itself. This could have been avoided by soft skills and making Jeffery Goldberg aware of the ramifications if this situation was escalated.

The American political environment now is one of muscular aggression and combative disposition. The situation has become combustible, and a flame has turned into a forest fire. 

Through it all, President Trump has remained unperturbed. The mission was accomplished and this too will pass. It is said that privately, he is seething and that he knows this will be seen as the first major blow to his administration.

Yesterday, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Director of the FBI Kash Patel and Director of the CIA John Ratcliffe were roasted during their testimony at a  House Committee hearing on the matter on Capitol Hill. They were made to look incompetent and facile.

Representative Jimmy Gomez said that Signal was not used to discuss what is for lunch today, but rather they were discussing men and women of the armed services going in harm’s way, which is a major decision. He then asked Gabbard whether Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, given his problems with alcohol, was drinking at the time the leak took place.

It was not a good day for the Directors, and calls were made for Pete Hegseth to resign immediately. President Trump is unlikely to force him to do so, but his credibility is now weakened.

Representative Jason Crow had this to say: “Responsibility is core to leadership. You accept responsibility when things go wrong. You admit mistakes. You set the standard from the very top. It is completely outrageous to me that administration officials come before us today with impunity. No acceptance of responsibility, excuse, after excuse, after excuse. No one has said this was a breach of security and we won’t do it again.

“This is outrageous and a leadership failure, and that’s why Secretary Hegseth, who undoubtedly transmitted classified sensitive operational information via this chain, must resign immediately.”

Former Assistant Secretary of Defence Mara Karlin said the leak is “ stunning and not normal.”

This is a political situation, and the Democrats will be looking for blood.. When Hillary Clinton was running for the presidency in 2016, her campaign was upended by her use of a private email server at the State Department. Donald Trump called for her to go to jail.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who is in Jamaica trying to bring that country onsid,e then said of Hillary Clinton’s use of the email server: “ The exposure of sensitive information to foreign intelligence agencies by communicating in an insecure manner is incompetence, it is malpractice, it’s inexcusable.”

That would apply to this present situation. It can’t be swept under the carpet. Some may even argue that the Houthi situation and Yemen thread breach is a more serious than Hillary Clinton’s slip, which the FBI said was extremely careless but not criminal.

It is incredulous to think that this important military information was leaked to a member of the press via a group chat. It has serious implications for U.S. defence operations. This military execution detail could have so easily ended up in the hands of U.S. adversaries, even the Houthi rebels.

Greater care will be needed going forward.

Marco Rubio, who was in Jamaica this week, is recognised as one of President Trump’s most respected Cabinet members. He is smart and straightforward. He didn’t prevaricate and obfuscate like the Directors did at the House Committee Hearing on the matter, but then again, they were in the hot seat.

It comes as little surprise that of all President Trump’s senior Cabinet members, Marco Rubio got overwhelming Senate approval for his confirmation (99-0) to become Secretary of State.

Addressing the  Signal app usage to communicate on the military strike on the Houthi rebels, Marco Rubio, speaking from Jamaica, was sanguine, stressing a mistake was made and that this should never happen again.

“Signal was set up for purposes of coordinating how everyone was going to call when these things happen. I need to call foreign ministers around the world, we need to notify members of Congress, members of the team. That’s why it was set up. Someone made a big mistake and added a journalist- nothing against journalists but they ain’t supposed to be on that thing! They got on there, and this happened.

“I can speak to my presence on it. I contributed to it twice. I identified my point of contact, which is my Chief-Of-Staff, and then three hours after the Houthi situation, I congratulated the members of the team.

“ I’ve been assured by the Pentagon and everyone involved that none of the information on there threatened the operation. Or the lives of our servicemen. The Pentagon says the information on there was not classified. It didn’t put in danger anyone’s life. There was no intelligence information. When this story first broke, they were alluding to maps and war plans – there were no war plans on there.

“The White House is looking at this entire thing. How did that journalist get on there? I think reforms and changes will be made so this never happens again,” said the U.S. Secretary of State.