We promised a longer take on the Pentagon “leaks”, and here it goes. Regular readers will probably be familiar with my view on leaked documents in general, but if you’re not allow me to quote my own 2019 article on the (absurd) “Afghanistan papers”:
An awful lot of modern “leaks” are no such thing. They are Orwellian exercises in controlling the conversation […] carefully making sure the “establishment” and the “alternative” are joined in the middle, controlled from the same source.
That’s not to say ALL “leaks” are automatically and ubiquitously narrative control exercises, clearly some are real…but it’s usually pretty easy to tell them apart. In fact here’s a little checklist.
Hellbound and Down 