What if the U.S. Can’t Keep a Secret? The Real Impact of Manning’s Leaks

By Kevin Hulbert

Kevin Hulbert is a former senior intelligence officer in the CIA's Directorate of Operations who retired in June 2014.  He is currently the President of XK Group.  Kevin served multiple overseas tours as CIA Chief of Station and Deputy Chief of Station.

Now that the dust has settled on President Obama’s unexpected decision to, his last week in office, commute the sentence of Chelsea Manning, it’s worth revisiting what it might mean for U.S. national security. 

The decision surprised everyone.  Left wing, right wing, everyone was left scratching their heads as to why and, why now?  There was a collective groan from the Intelligence Community, men and women whose jobs were made a lot more difficult because of Wikileaks. 

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