THE CIPHER BRIEF SPEAKEASY IS OPEN FOR BUSINESS (BRIEFLY): While all the buzz was about The Cipher Brief HONORS Dinner last weekend and the amazing honorees and presenters, (it really was like the Oscars of national security), one of the most popular parts of the evening happened after all of the awards had been presented at The Cipher Brief speakeasy. While The Cipher Brief certainly isn’t Vanity Fair or anything, we have to say that they hosted a pretty cool after party. Spotted among those celebrating the evening: ABC News Anchor and Correspondent Martha Raddatz, former Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence Dr. Michael Vickers, former InQTel CEO & President Chris Darby, former Deputy Director of CIA for Digital Innovation Jennifer Ewbank, Ambassador Doug Lute and his arguably better half, former Deputy Secretary and COO of the Department of Homeland Security Jane Lute, former Director of Cybersecurity at the National Security Agency Rob Joyce, The Hon. Michele Flournoy, former CIA COO John Edwards, former Deputy Director of CIA’s National Clandestine Service CIA Mark Kelton, former Director of Strategic Operational Planning at NCTC VADM Mike LeFever, former JIOC Commander at U.S. Cyber Command Col. Candice Frost (Ret.), Former Commander of U.S. Special Operations Command General Tony Thomas, former former Director of the NSA and Commander of U.S. Cyber Command General Paul Nakasone former senior CIA Officers Ralph Goff, Glenn Corn and about a million more…. we could literally go on all night…and we hear the speakeasy almost did.
A PR PLAN FOR SIGNAL-GATE 3.0: There have been two reported Signal-gate incidents so far but who’s counting? Seeing as The Dead Drop likes to look ahead, we thought we’d be so bold as to offer a better PR plan for the next one. Beyond the alleged mishandling of national security information – the two cases so far have proven to be textbook examples of how not to communicate during a crisis situation. Those textbooks must have been on the government’s new “banned book” list though because the government response was “But there was no ‘classified’ information here. That ain’t a ‘war plan’. Who is leaking this classified information about our non-classified discussions? And Hey, what a great operation, eh? And then all of that was followed by: “We are going to investigate and prosecute the deep staters who leaked this” (because they must be “deep state” if they call out anything wrong, right?) and “We’ve fired 3 or 4 people (we just brought in 90 days ago)” Also, Why is the entire Pentagon being so mean to us? Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s supporters seem to be blaming all the trouble on “anonymous sources” – which is also a bit odd seeing that just about everyone involved has issued statements on X, written OPEDs in Politico, appeared on Tucker Carlson’s podcast, or engaged in finger pointing at a somewhat junior high school level. Our free PR advice: Imagine if the initial response had been: “Man, we screwed that up. So sorry. Fortunately, no harm was done but we have learned our lesson and it won’t happen again.” Sometimes the straight-forward path is the best one, eh?
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